A daily activity for many of us is hoping over to Twitter to see what new followers we have. We watch as more people follow us, as we believe they have an interest in what we Tweet about and in turn follow them back. Unaware of what just happened, they just unfollowed you. How dare they?
Social Morals
This practice of following and then once they’ve got you to reciprocate to unfollow you is becoming an all to common problem. I don’t quite understand the theory if there even is one, nor do I believe it’s socially moral and Twitter is after all, social interaction. If I’m going to follow you most especially after you followed me first I feel it’s only fair you should continue to follow me.
Now there are exceptions to this rule. I do get those who follow me who are just an outright scam so of course I won’t be following them back. But for the legit or seemingly so it’s just not a good practice and I’ll not stand idly by.
The good news is there is a way to combat this. The weapon, FriendOrFollow a Twitter tool that allows you to see who you are following you but is not following you back.
FriendOrFollow
The tool is very basic and simple to use. All one needs to do is:
1. Enter your Twitter name and submit
2. Click on the picture of the person you wish to stop following
3. On their Twitter profile click on follow to bring up the unfollow button
4. Unfollow them and your done
FriendOrFollow Guidelines
There are a few thing to note when using FriendOrFollow.
1. In your search results it will list all those who are not following you. Yes even those you want to follow but you’ll probably never see them follow you back.
I do have a few I follow that don’t follow me back and I’m ok with that because I want to see their Tweets. Be watchful of this when going threw your results and not to accidentally unfollow those you wish to follow.
2. Be sure to give FriendOrFollow time to put those you recently followed into the system. If you just followed someone and do a search chances are they won’t be in there yet as following you. I don’t know the exact turn around but it is fairly quick.
3. Some people just unfollow you and not for evil, it happens.
Other FriendOrFollow Tools
While the unfollow tool part of FriendOrFollow is the mainstay you also have the option to see those who follow YOU, that you are not following back. It does happen when you get an influx of new followers that you may miss following someone back for whatever reason. This is a good place to check that out.
You can also see your friends, as represented by a full spread of pics. There is no real use that I can think of for this other then to see all followers in one big spectacle of photos.
heh, I just used this tool recently to drop off a few people that are on my list who I initially were following until they unfollowed me…talk about bad etiquette!
Hi Michael,
This tool it is a must when you finally reach your “Follow” limit which is around 2000 people that you can follow max or keep a ratio of Following/Followers = 1.1, just need to be below that limit and your fine to follow people after the 2000 limit. I reach that limit, so I just use this tool to unfollow all the people that are not following me back and then I can follow again all my new followers with no problem at all.
Luis
Marketing Business Review´s last blog post..DoFollow Blogs List of Lists
That’s another good reason to use it. The 2000 limit, nice mention.
thanks for the tip! it just makes sense why would we continue to follow who doesn’t follow us back?
thanks agaiN!
Mikes´s last blog post..Be Humble | Let others Praise You
I need to hunt them down and ask why they do that???
I am not so sure either why some people follow and then un-follow when you follow them back. Just doesn’t make sense, but anyway, i don’t just follow anybody, bu I will follow back whoever follow me, unless they do the above
I feel it’s good to pick and choose who we follow. There are a few too many “bad” people to follow. I follow most but make a point of looking into who they are first and what they offer.
Nope I just don’t get it. When I venture back into Twitter, I will follow who I like depending on certain criteria and not follow who doesn’t match it….it will have nothing to do with who is or isn’t following me on it’s own.
Dennis Edell´s last blog post..Business Mentors, Advisers & Coaches
Indeed “friend or follow” is a great twitter tool, however to me it is kinda impossible to follow everyone whos following me and while i would love to follow everyone who follow me. I’ve learned that I can’t answer everyone, not to mention inactive users, machines, spammers and otherwise uncool people. I’d rather follow few who I find interesting tweets, than following thousands hoping they’ll follow me back, and turn my twitter into an unreadable mess.
Salwa´s last blog post..Sunday Link Love – April 26th 2009
I have used it a few times great tool I have to admit =)
Arfan´s last blog post..Loving OpenX
I can vouch for some reasons people may change their minds. I think twitter has become more intimate, and less anonymous than other social networks. People tweet about what time they get up, the type of shampoo their using, what they eat, where they work, places they party,etc.. I think this can scary. Maybe they realize suddenly this is dangerous and giving this type of info to complete strangers is not so wise.
I am contemplating creating another twitter account because I have 2 very different types of things I do online. 1 Business is lingerie,and the other is Business ops, I am not so sure both groups of followers would like to hear tweets from both businesses. And sometimes it is hard to tell where followers come from. I will be contemplating this move for awhile.
I guess my point is, there are probably many reasons- not necessarily all of them devious for people to quit following.
Sherri-Anne Myers´s last blog post..Pyrabang Review Excellent Advertising and Earning Opportunity
No not all are devious, I myself unfollow those who have nothing to offer. However one must be aware of those who do use it that way.
very nice site and useful information site.
That is a good tool. I used to use it until I discovered Tweepular.com. This is a great tool that lets you bul follow and bulk onfollow instead of having to do it manually.
Tycoon Blogger´s last blog post..Best Twitter tool for follower management
Awesome tool to use. I wonder why people do that though. Why would you follow someone and then unfollow them. Twitter is like a step into someone else world. You never know what a person may tweet. It just maybe something that will help your life or make you more money.
Kushmoney´s last blog post..How To Get Started With Affiliate Marketing
Hey this is cool! Now Twittering will be so interesting I think!! thanks!!
there are just people that follows you for a while and then remove you to their list when they want new followers, such a pretty bad thing about twitter users.
People follow then un follow because they want people see their websites then move on to someone else so they can see their websites. I found useful tips on http://www.squidoo.com/twitter-tools-annihilation
Yes, it does feel insulting when people do not follow back or unfollow – but self evaluation sometimes is appropriate (e.g. am I being interesting enough to follow?)
Hi! I was surfing and found your blog post… nice! I love your blog.
Cheers! Sandra. R.