Problem, Solution, Result — How to Make Twitter Work for You

Last week I wrote an article, featured in LinkedIn News, about my having unfollowed, the previous week, 99 percent of my 10K+ Twitter followers. I pointed out in that post that before I’d decided to unfollow that 99 percent, I’d first set up two private Twitter lists as a means to easily keep an eye on folk whose tweets I still wanted to follow.

I did this as a sort of first-stage test to see how well this would work.

In actual fact, it worked so well that it inspired me to take the next step — anticipated for years now — to return to a relatively small cadre of folk whereby I could truly follow their tweets and engage in a more consistent way with their goings-on.

Straight away this made my Twitter home feed a font of inspiration, learning, and tribe-building potential, as I could once again easily connect up with folk in a meaningful way.

But some might think this crazy. Others have been inspired to do as I’ve done, or to at least cut down on the number of folk they’re following.

For those who might still be waiting in the wings, are intrigued by the idea, or are already raring to go, today’s article briefly addresses the underlying problem and then suggests three straightforward solutions that will get you results.

The Problem: Awash with the Unwanted

Given that my Twitter home feed had previously run like a ticker tape filled with stuff I mostly didn’t care about, I hardly ever looked at it. My home feed was thereby rendered useless.

If you don’t care about connecting up with your followers via your home feed, or a subset thereof, then this article’s probably not for you.

If, on the other hand, you truly want to engage with your followers — perhaps as a means to grow your business and profits by way of building a tribe of loyal follower-reader-customers or simply to connect up with folk on a personal level — then it’s important to cull the tweets you really want to see from the far greater number that most likely serve as a distraction.

If you see the benefit of engaging a relative few folk far more easily and efficiently, below are three straightforward solutions to the problem of a home feed that’s awash with the unwanted.

The Radical Solution: Not for the Faint of Heart

Put simply, the radical solution is to go through the folk you follow and unfollow everyone whose tweets you don’t really want to see in your home feed.

As noted in last week’s article, you can count on losing a fair share of your present followers who will, by way of various means, soon find out that you’ve unfollowed them and will be quite quick to unfollow you in return. It’s a dog eat dog Twittersphere!

The truth is, however, that such folk are likely not engaging with your tweets, as otherwise they’d likely be amongst those you want to continue following.

So the perceived loss is a purely conceptual or numerical one. Thus the reason I referred to such folk last week as phantom followers.

I estimated that I’d likely lose 20 percent of my followers the first week. That turned out to be a good guess. I, in fact, lost 17.8 percent at the time of writing last week’s article.

Now, more than two weeks after firing 99 percent of my followers, I’ve lost 21.7 percent. So, as I’d predicted last week, the rate at which I continue to lose followers has slowed dramatically. That said, I will continue to lose folk, while likewise gaining new followers — including folk who, notably, followed me directly after having read last week’s article, knowing that it was highly unlikely I’d follow them back (in one case I did).

But, again, this is not a true loss of value, but rather merely an interesting phenomenon to note.

The big question for those considering the radical solution is whether they’re comfortable losing a decent share of their followers, knowing full well that you’ll not be able to predict with certainty who’ll stay and who’ll go. The upside to going whole hog is that you’ll thereby take back your home feed — and every tweet you see there will be from someone whose tweets you truly want to see.

This, ultimately, is what drove my decision to unfollow 99 percent of my followers. Just as importantly, however, was my wanting to be wholly authentic and not perpetuate a quid pro quo arrangement whereby I’m following someone so that they’ll follow, and continue to follow, me. As I said last week, this, to my internal compass, amounts to soul-sapping inauthenticity which I wanted to bring an end to. That’s strictly my opinion as it pertains to me. Others will, of course, view things differently, and might well be comfortable with this quid pro quo arrangement.

The Win-Win Solution: Having One’s Cake and Eating it Too

Most folk aren’t going to unfollow virtually all of their followers, if for no other reason than to prevent their own follower number dropping by a magnitude of twenty or more percent.

Such folk probably don’t realize, or want to admit, that these phantom followers aren’t actually engaging with their tweets. It’s far easier to turn a blind eye, and carry on playing a game of mutual make pretend.

The good news is that if you’re amongst this majority who won’t (at least at present) pursue the radical solution, above, there’s a simple solution whereby you can simultaneously realize virtually all the benefits of the radical approach without being radical.

In other words, you’ll be able to have those tweets from folk you truly want to see automatically rise to the top such that you need never again look at your swamped home feed.

And you won’t risk losing followers by unfollowing them. They’ll (falsely) assume you’re still interested in seeing their tweets — or, perhaps as likely, won’t even care whether or not you see their tweets so long as you don’t rain on their follower count parade — even though, in actual fact, their tweets will come and go without your notice.

Thus the win-win solution. You keep your followers and they, in turn, keep you as a follower, and, yet, you’re still able to easily follow just those tweets you truly want to see.

So what, exactly, is the win-win solution? And how do you pull it off?

Simply create a list in Twitter — either public or private — and add folk to it whose tweets you truly want to see. You can then quite easily view those tweets as a sort of virtual home feed, or, as I did, add a new stream in Hootsuite or similar app that automatically pulls in the tweets of everyone on your Twitter list.

And if you’d prefer to categorize such folk into a number of different lists you can create multiple Twitter lists — again, public or private — and add a new stream in Hootsuite, for example, for each such list. See the below win-win-win solution for additional details.

The Win-Win-Win Solution: The Best of All Possible Worlds, or the Wholehearted Solution

For those who’d like the best of all possible worlds — and who are comfortable losing a portion of their present (phantom) followers — there’s the win-win-win, or wholehearted, solution.

Simply put, this is the above two solutions combined.

You, first, take back your home feed by unfollowing everyone whose tweets you don’t truly want to see. And, then, you categorize those remaining followers whose tweets you do want to see into (public or private) Twitter lists.

In my case, I created two private lists named: 1) Influencers and 2) Friendly Connections. And I straight away added two new streams in Hootsuite to contain these two virtual feeds.

So although my Twitter home feed contains the tweets of all those I follow, I can immediately hone in on the tweets of those within my two Twitter lists.

If, for example, I want to look for an article or similar informative or inspiring tweet to read myself and perhaps, then, share with one or more of my networks — say via Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook — I can quickly scroll through my Influencer feed in Hootsuite. Or, if I want to see what my Friendly Connections are tweeting about, and perhaps to engage with their tweets, I can just as easily scroll through my Friendly Connections feed.

In this way, you’ll have access to a minimalist home feed (Win 1), while being able to quickly peruse the type of tweet you’re interested in seeing in that moment (Win 2).

And what about Win 3?

Win 3 comes in no longer playing the quid pro quo follower game. Instead, you’ll only follow those whose tweets you truly want to see. You’ll thereby gain a truly authentic, or wholehearted, Twitter experience. And building your tribe and otherwise engaging with folk via Twitter will instantly become far more enjoyable, efficient and effective.

Which of these three solutions appeals most to you, and why? Or have you taken an entirely different approach to managing your Twitter feed? Share your thoughts in the comments below. And if you enjoyed reading this article, I’d greatly appreciate your clicking the thumbs-up button, or otherwise sharing it with your tribe. If you’d like help building your tribe — and, thereby, growing your business and profits — shoot us an email at [email protected].

This article first appeared on the CreativeThunder.co blog

Image: Problem Solution Result

Sean M. Madden is Co-Founder & CEO of CreativeThunder.co, working with creative businesses and individuals, worldwide, to build tribes of loyal customers via strategic websites, visual storytelling, and social media. Get CreativeThunder.co posts.