Actual engagement
Posted by David Wees on Dec 8, 2011
A Twitter user named "Distance Education" with the user name 'onlinecourse' has followed me 25 times. This suggests that they have also unfollowed me at least 24 times. This kind of behaviour I've heard called 'follower-churn.'
I may have accidentally unfollowed someone, and then followed them back. I certainly haven't been using this to gain followers. I follow people because they are interesting to me, and I manually follow each person I find, after reading through some of their tweets. It's a bit onerous, but it does tend to ensure that I get a better selection of information from the people I'm following.
Distance Education is currently at 6565 followers. I have roughly the same number. Who do you think is interested in actual engagement, and who is just looking to pad their numbers? Hint: It's called social media for a reason.
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About David
David is a mathematics teacher and a learning specialist for technology at Stratford Hall in Vancouver, BC. He has been teaching since 2002, and has worked in Brooklyn, London, and Bangkok before moving back to Canada. He has his Masters degree in Educational Technology from UBC, and is the co-author of a mathematics textbook. He has been published in ISTE's Leading and Learning, Educational Technology Solutions, The Software Developers Journal, The Bangkok Post and Edutopia. He blogs with the Cooperative Catalyst, and is the Assessment group facilitator for Edutopia. He has also helped organize the first Edcamp in Canada, and TEDxKIDS@BC.
Disclaimer: The ideas discussed on this blog are my own, and in no way represent those of my employer.
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Comments
Turkey!
That same Distance Education has followed and unfollowed me a bunch of times too. I had wondered what was up. Thanks for shedding light on what is up with this twitterer. I think it's time to block someone.
follow/unfollow
Yes, me too. I kept seeing the same name come up and it took me a while to figure out that this is a tactic. Hint: If I didn't want to follow the first time, chances are I still won't on the seventh time.
I often don't follow back new followers, simply because i find it difficult to manage and get the most of the Twitter experience, when there are too many to follow. But it's 'social' media, as you said, David, so I will always follow back people who actually engage with me in some way.
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