Two F-bombs and a Pile of Poop…

I like Twitter.  I communicate with some consumers as ell as some of my peers through Twitter.  As an organizer of Social Media Breakfast Atlanta (#smbatl), we use Twitter for promotion as well as to recap… and even during the event.  Heck, I have 1200+ followers and almost 2800 updates… obviously I think it is a worthwhile tool.

But as I was reviewing my new followers, I was actually shocked by a tweet from one of them… needless to say, I did NOT choose to follow them back.  In under 140 characters she dropped the F-bomb twice… and had a couple of poop commentaries (she utilized another short word).

Personally, I’m not offended by colorful language.  I have been known to use a little myself… especially in Atlanta traffic…  But I don’t generally use it lightly and over a manicure appointment…  Ok, I don’t get manicure appointments, but if I did I don’t think I would cuss at the world if it got canceled because someone was sick… especially if the salon called to let me know before I showed up.

But all of that is just unimportant detail…

The important part…

This was a person with an appropriate avatar.  They have a respectable number of followers.  They had several hundred updates.  But the first thing I saw when they followed me was a string of obscenities over nothing.  Is that how ANY of us wish to represent ourselves? I think not…

Back when the rest of the country was playing with CB radios (we Jeep guys STILL use them), everyone knew what the squelch dial was.  The short definition is that it was a knob that lowered the sensitivity of the radio and got rid of background noise.

I just turned the squelch dial on that one…  And I do it regularly.  On my @LaneBailey account, I am pretty open to whom I choose to follow back.  Aside from spammers, pornbots and people that just broadcast crap all of the time… I’m likely to follow back.  But with my @Lilburn account… not so much.  If you aren’t in Gwinnett County, I probably won’t follow you back.  I have a few people in the industry I follow… but it is consumer and geographically focused.

Don’t be afraid to use the squelch dial…

Turn down the noise.  Don’t follow people that aren’t worth following.  Unfollow people that aren’t worth following.  And don’t contribute to the noise, either…  Be follow worthy.  And to be honest… I am not always follow-worthy. I have too many of my blog posts going to Twitter automatically.  I need to spend more time engaging.  But at least I have crossed the first step… I know there is something I need to fix.

And that is the final idea… Examine your presence on ALL of your networks.  Change it as needed.