Monday 7 March 2011

Keeping retweets real

Twitter retweets are something I covet. There I've said it...

They're a great way to get your information out to a whole new set of people that might be interested. There's also that rather contented feeling of having said something that people value enough to share with their followers!

Some of the most interesting feeds I follow consist almost entirely of retweets. Where there is an effort made to select relevant and good quality information, I'm happy to carry on following and letting someone else winnow through the mass of information on the internet to find me something interesting to read.

However, some folks are retweeting anything and everything in their feed. When someone repeatedly starts retweeting the autotweets from their feed (see my previous blog) then you know you're only seconds away from an unfollow - or at least I am.

Then there's that really annoying habit of retweeting any and all follow friday mentions.

Or the one where a person retweets the fact that someone retweeted them.

How about the people that just can't keep their mouse off the Twitter retweet button?

Sending out some good quality retweets is vital when using twitter for business. They help us show what we find interesting and important both as a business and as a person. Retweets demonstrate our values, our expertise, our humour and much more. Your reputation as a business on Twitter will be greatly enhanced if you actively consider the content of retweets as part of your overall strategy.

So, next time you're reading your feed - think about what you choose to retweet. Keep those retweets real!


Edit: Since I first wrote this blog Twitter has introduced a feature whereby you can turn off retweets from specific accounts. It's useful to keep your feed manageable. It's also worth trying to be the sort of person that doesn't get their retweets muted!