Before I Follow You

By the time I click your follow button, here’s what I’ve done:

• I’ve reviewed you profile
• I’ve browsed your most recent 40-to-60 tweets
• I’ve clicked through to the website you linked to in your profile and, if it wasn’t an offer to buy an amazing product I can’t live without, I’ve browsed several pages of that site—most likely including the About Us page.
• And maybe I’ve received one or more @replies from you even before I’ve had a chance to review the other information, and I’ve enjoyed the interaction.

This activity has led me to believe at least one of the following about you:

• I’d enjoy having a conversation with you about the things that interest you
• We have enough in common that we might help each other out from time-to-time
• It seems likely I’ll learn something from you
• The way you communicate is entertaining, and I’ll get a kick out of seeing it in my twitter stream.
• Your views are so incomprehensibly different from mine, that I want to stick around and try to understand what’s wrong with you.

How I Found You

You most likely found me, and when you started to follow, I launched my modest investigation of you. I was probably flattered that you followed, and had a twinge of anxiety that my tweets might not deliver anything of interest to you. If you started following me, and I didn’t follow you back within a week or two, you might be interested in my post Why I Didn’t Follow You Back.

I might have found you when someone I already followed tweeted to you, and I really wanted to hear the whole conversation. Believe it or not, I still checked you out before I clicked your follow button.

It’s less likely, but still possible, that I found you in a group or that a service such as MrTweet recommended you or that I found your blog first and your twitter name was there. Again, even with a recommendation, I snooped through your profile, tweets, and links before I followed.

If you didn't look at my profile, my tweets, and my blog(s) before you started following, that's OK. Welcome aboard! I hope I don't disappoint you too much.

Here are some thoughts about annoying Twitter behaviors of Internet marketers: Social Marketing Strategies: An Ugly Twitter Presence

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