A Twitter Newbie’s first approximation for a code of conduct

   I have been on Twitter many months now. I’ve read a lot of great articles, saw some great photos and art, and had a laugh or two. Along the way I’ve been working on my personal code of conduct.

Rule Number 1: I won’t try to sell you.

   I won’t be asking you to buy any of my novels or short stories on Twitter. Ever. Promise.
   For writers, musicians, and movie stars that have a large following, I’m sure they find Twitter is a great tool to keep in touch with their fans. But for the rest of us, I don’t think that Twitter works for direct marketing and I am almost positive that incessantly spamming your followers with BUY MY BOOK or whatever is going to produce much in the way of sales. It has the opposite effect on me.
   Only rarely do I check the general feed because when I do I am overwhelmed with a torrent of tweets. To get the most out of Twitter I have made a select list of my favorites. Instead of wading through a flood of tweets I just go check out my favorites to see if they have anything interesting for me. No one on my favorites list spams their followers with BUY MY STUFF tweets. I bet there are a lot of folks like me.
   I will tweet links to my blog. And maybe I will tweet links to Smashwords where you can get my novels and short stories for free.
   I want you to read my blog, my novels and my short stories. I hope you enjoy them. I hope you’ll post comments. I hope you will leave positive reviews.
   What I’m hoping to do is connect with people, not to sell them.

Rule Number 2: I won’t post just because I can.

   I’m not going to tweet the mundane. I won’t give the weather forecast; I won’t tell you I’m getting out of bed; I won’t tell you I’m having Shredded Wheat for breakfast.
   Most of my tweets will be retweets. There are a lot of interesting and creative people out there and I want to share their insightful, funny or beautiful thoughts.

Rule Number 3: If you’re not a troll, I’ll follow you back

   No, I’m not going to pay $5 for 20,000 followers. Who would do that anyway?
   And what about those people that follow you and immediately unfollow you after you’ve followed them? I guess they think people will think they are a superstar with their 100 to 1 ratio? What I think is that they’re trolls. Tools like ManageFlitter will help you throw those trolls back under the bridge.
   But if you are a real person then I’ll follow you back. I’ll look at your latest tweets. I’ll check out your blog if you have one. If you have content that I connect with, then I’ll add you to my favorites list.

Observation: On Facebook I have friends; on Twitter I have followers.

   On Facebook I connect with people I know; on Twitter I connect with people that have common interests. On Facebook I share photos of me and my family; on Twitter I talk about books and writing mostly.
   I hope this doesn’t rub you the wrong way if you have a Facebook fan page. I’m not saying that there is anything wrong with that. It’s
just not for me.

   Please find me @StepClary on Twitter and tell me your Twitter Code of Conduct.