The use of the #FollowFriday hashtag or the newly shortened #ff has been around for a while and if used correctly can be a nice way of spreading some love on Twitter. By recommending a Twitter pal or two each week you show your appreciation for those you follow and you help to introduce people which starts relationships, and isn’t that what Twitter is all about? I’ve written before on the 4 Ways to Improve Your Follow Friday Recommendations, but today I want to talk about how not to use this hashtag.
The public Twitter guilt trip:
My #FF recommendation is @favtwitterpal and even tho they don’t follow me, I will continue to follow them cause I like their tweets.
@favtwitterpal doesn’t follow me anymore, but I still recommend them! #followfriday
Nothing like a little public guilting to get people to follow you, no?
Please note that none of the above are direct quotes, nor are they aimed at any of my followers. I’ve only been on the receiving end of this kind of things a few times, but I’ve seen a great deal of them floating about the Twitterverse…
Or, how about the mass #ff tweets? Nothing but a list of names. Tell me, why should I follow these people? Who are they? What is their niche? Are they just your friends or will I be learning something from them?
What’s the worst #FollowFriday tweet you’ve seen? Any other things you wouldn’t recommend for #FF?
I did do a “people I've seen naked” FF once in my early days (trying to be different). Didn't go down too well…
LOL @Rhys, that is unique.
The #FF followed by a list of names has to be my pet peeve. I mean come on, you don't care enough to say something about each person?
Haha. I'd say it didn't.
I think its down to whether you look at Twitter as a numbers game -the shotgun – spraying people with information or whether you want to connect. Those who look at it as anumbers game with just ff a list – those of us who want to commincate say something relevant.
Exactly! I’ve actually been unfollowing people because the numbers game is tiring and I just want to have some real conversations like we used to.
I do like the idea of “people I’ve seen naked” – risky but I would have a look! Matt
No kidding, right? I think human nature is curious and every one of us would look!
[...] their tone is unexciting and they don’t use hashtags … except for #FollowFriday, which they’re doing correctly and I can dig [...]