Firstly, I have decided not to blog here anymore. If you’ve been following along, you’ll know that I am incredibly inconsistent in my blogging efforts anyway, so it’s no great to loss. Rather, corinamackay.com will become a landing page, essentially, to show off my work, explain what I do, and provide details about how to get me on your team.

I will continue tweeting @corinamackay with news, information and articles about social media and emerging technologies.

And, for anyone who is interested, my personal tweets, creative, arts and theatre-related content continues over at @Buttercupples. This is generally where I carry on Twitter discussions these days, as well.

And lastly, if you really want to see what I’m writing (and thinking about), I’ve started a Tumblr blog at Buttercupples.tumblr.com, where I compile quotes, images, ideas, information and writing to inspire and motivate myself and others.

Of course, if you would like to get in touch with me directly, you can find me on the contact page, or around the web (links to the right).

1. It’s not a numbers game

We’ve all heard people say the number of Twitter followers you have doesn’t mean anything, but who doesn’t want a million people hanging on their every tweet? Well, listen up folks: they’re right – the numbers don’t matter. I was surprised that my new account soon had a small but highly engaged group of followers. In the first week of using my new account, I had 17 followers – all of whom I knew, and talked to regularly. Knowing that the people following me are truly interested in what I have to say, and enjoy having regular conversations with me makes Twitter more fun. Having a small follower count doesn’t matter if you engage with them all.

2. Selective following makes for a better Twitter experience

Not only do I have less followers on my new account, but I’m also following less people. I’ve often tweeted in the past about following too many people with my original account. This often leads to a stream of tweets that just don’t interest me. By being more selective about who I followed this time around, I curated a Twitter stream full of stellar tweets from people I admire. Every tweet in that stream is from someone whose thoughts I want to hear. Twitter shouldn’t be about digging through your stream to find gold – the gold should surface by itself.

3. If you leave, your ‘real friends’ will follow you

I know, I know – clichéd, right? But my point is this: those 17 people who followed my new account in the first week were all followers of my original account. They all read my tweets, thus finding out I had moved my personal/arts-related tweets to a new account. And, most importantly, they all cared enough about what I have to say that they followed my new account. Yes, there were only 17 of them to begin with, but as that number grows, it’s fascinating to see which of my original group of followers made the effort to chase me up at my new account.

Final Thoughts

You don’t need to start a new Twitter account to put these things into practice. Cutting back on who you follow can be a great way to improve the quality of your stream. You don’t need to unfollow everyone to get this done, either. Being selective about who you follow, and developing great relationships through interaction and conversation will make Twitter a better place to be – for you and your followers.

Speaking of developing relationships through interaction, Google+ is a great place to do that. Have you tried it out yet? If you’ve joined up already, you can add me to your circles, or let me know if you’re looking for an invite.

Your Thoughts

What have you done to improve your Twitter experience? Have you got some great tips I’ve missed? Let me know!

Another important note before we get into the nitty gritty of all your disgraceful offences: I am guilty of some of the below myself. I recently realized I was retweeting far too often to be of any value to my followers. The horror of my trespasses reared its ugly head when a conversation with @nataliegiddings and @KatDrewer helped to point out these and other irritating misuses of Twitter.

I know you’ll have your own pet peeves and frustrating Twitter-traits you’ve come across that you’ll want to share, so please leave a comment and let me know what drives you crazy!

DON’T send auto-DMs

Less than 24 hours after hitting that shiny follow button in a showing of your affection and loyalty for another user (or potentially just a passing interest in what they have to say), your inbox lights up with a spammy, self-promotional message, directing you to a website, a Facebook page, or a Youtube channel. Or, perhaps it just says “Thanks for following me! I can’t wait to get to know you!”.

Think about this: you’ve followed this person for one of two reasons. Either you already know enough about them to be interested in what they have to say, and therefore know about or have visited their website already. OR, you have come across them through a recommendation or a simple stroll across the interwebs, and have followed them in the hopes they will add value to your Twitter stream. In either of these cases, are you going to visit the link they send you in a DM like this?

Not only is this an impersonal auto-DM, I had already visited this site, which was under construction at the time

DO start a conversation

IAs I said to @KatDrewer, if you want to reach out to your new followers, there are better ways to do it. Sending a tweet (whether it’s a DM or a mention, auto-generated or handcrafted and heart-felt) that says “Hey, thanks for following me!” adds nothing to that person’s stream but clutter.

f you want to engage your followers, keep them interested in your content, and encourage them to visit your other profiles around the web, start a conversation. Unlike an auto-DM that will be deleted and forgotten, a conversation over two or three tweets will create a connection that you can build on to create a loyal follower.

DON’T tweet username lists for #followfriday

Here’s something that’s been written about over and over, but for some reason people still don’t get it. The origins of #followfriday have been discussed extensively as well, but for those who need a refresher, the tradition was started by @micah, with the intention of recommending one (I say ONE) other Twitter user who is worth following. Eventually, #followfriday expanded into what is now a fluffed-up, pretentious whisp of what it once was, with the majority of #followfriday tweets looking like this:

How NOT to do #followfriday

Not only are these tweets annoying, but I would hazard a guess that they do not promote many new followers for those users listed.

DO explain your recommendations

Although I’ve read reasons to not participate in #followfriday at all, I can see the value in recommending other Twitter users, whether you do so on a Friday or any other day. Most importantly, make sure your tweet explains what the person tweets about and why they are worth following.

DON’T retweet everything

I mentioned earlier that I have been guilty of this recently, and with a one-click retweet option, it can be easy to fall into this trap. Every inspirational, life-changing quote you come across that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy does not need to be retweeted for all of your followers. That is, of course, unless your Twitter feed is based primarily around quotes, in which case I wouldn’t be following you anyway, so feel free to retweet Abe Lincoln’s words of wisdom to your heart’s content.

DO re-tweet worthwhile content – occasionally

If you come across a tweet that contains some great content, do retweet it to your followers. Retweeting is one of myriad ways to contribute to the conversation on Twitter and curate great content. Just don’t let it be the only way you interact with your followers, or you’ll become an annoying and unnecessary middle man.

Recap

If you’ve been caught out doing these dastardly deeds, don’t despair. Let’s do a recap of the ways you can add value to Twitter, and engage your followers.

1. Start a conversation with new followers by asking questions or connecting over a shared topic of interest.
2. Recommend great Twitter users to your followers with an explanation of why they are worth following.
3. Use Twitter’s retweet function sparingly, with valuable content.

And lastly, if you’re not sure about something, ask! Reach out to those you respect and admire on Twitter and ask for help.

Happy tweeting!

More info/download: summify.com

Pros: Filters through your RSS subscriptions to find the most popular stories, easy sharing to your social networks

Cons: Not much good for those who like to see every story in their RSS reader

If you’ve read about the Internet tools I can’t live without, you may have noticed I mentioned a great web app called Summify. I wanted to explain in further detail what it does, and why I love it, so here’s a full Try This post dedicated to Summify.

Summify is all about reducing noise and clutter in your RSS reader, and making it easy to find the most popular and important news in your social networks. Check out this short video, or read on to find out how it works.

To sign up, you can use your Google, Twitter, or Facebook account, making it a quick and easy process. I found the app is most useful when all three of your accounts are connected, allowing Summify to analyse stories being shared across all your networks. The most popular stories are then shown in your Top News section, which also displays a sidebar titled Why you are seeing this story, where you can see who has shared the story in your social networks, and how many times it has been shared. There is also a Recent News section, so you can keep up with the newest stories being shared online.

For those who love to share great stories, you’ll love how easy it is with Summify. Just two clicks will send the link out to your Twitter, Facebook, and Google Reader accounts, but you also have the option to adjust the wording, and change which accounts you post to.

To make it even easier to ensure you see each day’s top news, Summify also offers a customizable email digest, which arrives in your inbox daily with your chosen number of popular stories. There’s even a mobile app in the works, which you can get updates about from Summify.com.

Head over to Summify.com to try it out now, and be sure to let me know what you think in the comments below, or on Twitter.

Like this post? Check out some of my other recommendations: GetGlue, About.me, and New Flock.

Visiting the Space Heroes site gives you the option to drag the spaceship onto your browser’s toolbar, like you would with an ordinary bookmarklet. After this drag-and-drop install, clicking the bookmarklet button on any website you visit will start the simple spaceship game. As far as I can tell, the game seems to consist of flying a spaceship around the web page and shooting M&Ms at nothing, so unless I’ve missed something, there seems to be a lot to be desired still, in terms of an intriguing social media marketing campaign. However, the idea of a branded experience that can be overlaid on any website is an interesting way of expanding the reach of a marketing campaign.

Source: Digital Buzz Blog; image from M&Ms Denmark

Inside Facebook recently reported

I’ve written before about how location services can be beneficial to businesses, and this is a great example of enabling users to be more involved, rather than passively accepting information. Enabling updates to place information by users will hopefully keep place data current, (especially for places that are unclaimed by business owners) and gives users more control over the places they check into frequently. Could this be a step closer for Facebook Places to match the popularity of Yelp or Foursquare?

Image from David Armano

NMA quoted Spotify Director of Label Relations Will Hope, who said,

“We want to give Spotify Premium users the very best exclusives and they don’t get much bigger than REM.”

The REM album release will coincide with a competition running until April 5th to win guitars, signed merchandise and sound systems.

The popular European streaming site was recently reported to have made deals with major music labels in the US, in hopes of cracking the tough market. Two out of four major labels have reportedly signed up, bringing the site closer to a hopeful US release.

Sources: New Media Age, Mashable; Image Source: Flickr

Spring Awakening 2011 at Hobart's Playhouse Theatre

I was lucky enough to recently attend a local production of Spring Awakening at Hobart’s Playhouse Theatre, and was surprised to find that the audience was primarily made up of students much younger than myself. I soon became aware that many of the teenagers sitting near me were friends of the cast and/or crew members of the production, and were attending more out of support for their friends than a love of theatre.

Whilst this in itself is not an issue, and most likely a common explanation for many bums on seats in theatre, the fact that Spring Awakening is a thought-provoking show, containing many adult concepts and references was highlighted in the reactions of many of the young audience members. To have teenage giggles and snickering surrounding me during some of the most intense and powerful scenes in the performance was distracting and frustrating.

This got me thinking – how much does the audience around you affect the way you enjoy (or don’t enjoy) a theatre performance? And how much should it affect you? Is it possible to respect the actors when the girls in the row in front of you are pointing at them and laughing? Is it possible to be affected by a serious message in a performance when the boys in the row behind you snicker every time a sexual reference is made, or the word gay is mentioned? Is possible even to laugh at the funniest moments of a show, when the rest of the audience is filling the emotional silences with giggles?

I am yet to walk out of a theatre and be sorry I went, including my experience of Spring Awakening. I was disappointed, however, that the audience did not seem to respect the performers as much as I had expected. I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this – have you been in a similar situation, as an audience member or a performer? How much do you think the audience members’ reactions affect the performance and the enjoyment of others attending the show?

Image credit: Ian Williams