The Social Media Blog - Methodical Madness

Social media tools to help you sort through the Cyber Monday chaos

There was a time when the after Thanksgiving price dropping frenzy was confined to the US. But a few years ago, some enterprising marketers went and created Cyber Monday – the online equivalent to Black Friday – letting shoppers across the world wide web get in on the action.

While the online slash fest is a great opportunity for every Christmas shopper on a budget, the vast amount of offers is staggering. To help you find your way to the deal you’ve been dreaming of, check out these social media tools that that help organize the madness into digestible chunks. 

Apps
The DealNews.com iPhone app was originally only geared towards Black Friday, but it’s now expanded to send the best Cyber Monday deals directly to your phone, minimizing the time you need to spend searching yourself.

If you’re in the States and combing the stores today, TGI Black Friday is a huge help in comparing deals on the go. It’s also useful for Monday, as many sellers feature the same deals online on Monday as in stores on Friday.

Twitter
Another way to have the deals sent directly to you is by following the Twitter feeds dedicated to finding Cyber Monday’s best deals. CyberMonday.com and Dealighted both provide nice feeds with frequently updated info and links to coupons. 

http://twitter.com/cyber_monday
http://twitter.com/dealightedcom


Facebook
Many retailers are using their Facebook pages to announce Cyber Monday deals early, so it could be worthwhile to join some new fan pages to get a head start.

Etsy is using Facebook to aggregate all their sellers for a huge Cyber Monday sale, check them out if you’re interested in handmade crafts.

If you need some gifts for the little ones, visit the Toys’r’Us Facebook page. They’re letting people vote on which toys they want to see go on sale on Monday.  

Deal Aggregators
And last but not least are the good old fashioned website aggregators. They let you search through deals from various stores by product category and price range. Cybermonday.com and cybermonday.fm are quite comprehensive resources for all your armchair shopping needs.

These were the best tools out there I could find. Do you have any social media tips for taking advantage of this year’s Cyber Monday?

9 Twitter apps that make it easy to share files

Welcome to Twitter Tuesday. Every Tuesday we will post about Twitter. Stop by for advice and how to's for marketing professionals. Every other week we will post our AppQuest Edition featuring a review of Twitter applications.

How do you share files on Twitter?

Growing your followers means you will move beyond the people that you personally know. I’ve met scores of people on Twitter that I will never meet in real life. I also don’t have personal contact information for many of the people I know on Twitter either. So how do you send someone a file online without their email address? Surprisingly, there are at least nine different sites that can answer that question for you. From presentations to mp3s to documents to zip files and anything else, they can now be sent via Twitter. This really opens up the use of Twitter from a simple communication tool to a new way to share large amounts of information.

I sat down with my co-workers and created a wish list of qualities that we as marketing people want in a Twitter file sharing tool. Of course, all the apps have to be free, easy-to-use and require no downloadable client. Beyond that, we wanted to be able to:

• store at least 15 mb of data
• share multiple file types: mp3, doc, ppt, zip, pictures, videos
• public and private tweets
• use OAuth so you don’t have to create a new account
• have it self-delete after a certain amount time
• share across multiple platforms

The evaluation method was simple. I visited each site and registered. After my profile loaded, I took a screenshot of the interface and then spent about ten minutes looking around the site. A decent site should be able to explain itself in that time. After using the application, I rated each site against my wish list.


 

Tweetcube allows you to upload zip, rar, pdf, jpg, png, gif, mp3 and txt files. Or at least it says it says it does. I could only get to step two and wasn’t able to upload anything. According to Tweetcube, you can upload as many 10 mb files as you want, and after 30 days they get deleted. Or you could if it worked. Ten megabytes seems to be the lower end of the uploading spectrum anyway. 

PROS: You can upload up to 10 mb, uses Twitter OAuth so you don’t have to create an account.

CONS: It doesn’t work. Tried several times over two days to use the site. At first it wouldn’t let me login. After I got past that, I was never able to upload a file.

RATING:

 

Tweetmojo allows you to share videos, photos, files and tweets of up to 1400 characters long. There is no mention of upper size limit on file sharing and a tweet to their Twitter account didn’t get a reply. I tried uploading a 36 MB pdf and after waiting 10 minutes, nothing happened. It didn’t give me any indication that the file is being uploaded, so I don’t know if I didn’t wait long enough or if it never tried to upload the file. The Twitter OAuth didn’t work either so I could never log in to post anything to Twitter. There is also a timeline so you can see what other people have uploaded from the site. Tweetmojo does allow you to record your own video and post it from the site by using the Viddler video recorder. That is, if the sign in feature worked.

PROS: Allows you to upload any file type and you can record you own videos from the site. Nice feature that allows you to add long posts without having to upload a file.

CONS: It didn’t work. I was able to upload smaller photo files and record a video, but could never sign in to Twitter to use it.

RATING:

 

Twi.tt gives you the ability to upload pictures, videos, documents, audio and create a poll. The screen is divided into tabs so you can select from which area you want to upload. Under each tab is a selection of options, such as upload from computer, get from website, capture from webcam or post by email. Most of the these options aren’t available yet but there is a message that it should “be added in just a few days.” You can choose between posting your file to Twitter or just putting it in the Twi.tt public timeline. There is no mention of file size or how your files are hosted on their system or for how long.

PROS: Hurray, it works! There doesn’t appear to be a file size limit and a 29 MB file uploaded just fine.

CONS: Most of the site’s features don’t work yet. It’s unclear what happened to your uploads after you share them.

RATING:

 

TwitFS offers a free non-account version, which is pretty good. You can upload up to 100 MB at once, you can share videos, audio, pictures and documents, and you can publish to Twitter, blogs, Facebook, MySpace, message boards and send via email. You can also store your file for 30 days, send a direct message to an individual or message everyone in your tweetstream. Once uploaded, your file gets its own page and you can share the url or embed it in another program. If you register with TwitFS, you can upload a file up to 250 MB, a file manager, a direct link to the file, parallel downloads and unlimited file storage. For a small fee starting at $0.99, you get up to 2.5 GB maximum file size.

PROS: It does everything we could want from a file sharing site. It’s worth registering with the site for added features.

CONS: Um....can’t find any.

RATING:

 

Filetweet is the simplest of the file sharing systems. You can send a file to an email account or a Twitter profile, attach a file, add a message and decide if you want to send a private message or not. It’s that simple, though it’s unclear how long the file stays on their servers. You can see recent uploads, but you can’t resend them or delete the files. Also, I received an error message every time I tried to send a file to an email account.

PROS: Very simple to use. Login with your Twitter account and you can send a file to all your followers or via direct message. The upper file size limit is 100 MB, which is huge. If you need to send a file quickly, this is the easiest way to go.

CONS: You can’t access files you’ve already sent. If you want to resend a file, you have to upload it again.

RATING:

 

Filesocial is the prettiest site of the file sharing tools. You can upload any file up to 50 MB and post it to your public Twitter timeline. The file is stored on their servers for an unknown amount of time. Filesocial sends out a message to your Twitter stream with a TinyURL. People can view your file, download it or leave a message on it. It also opens the file without having to download it. There is also a downloadable client that allows you to drag and drop files you want to share.

 

PROS: Easy tool that allows you to share any type of file on Twitter.

CONS: Filesocial only allows you to post to Twitter. You can take that URL and share it on other sites or post in an email, but you can’t do that directly from the site.

RATING:

 

FileTwt is another simple site. You enter your Twitter username and password, enter a 114 character message and upload a file up to 20 MB. The file then goes out on your public Twitter stream. The site creates a TinyURL that links back to a page where you can download the file. It works basically the same as Filesocial, but not as well. It also offers the ability to sign up for an account, which allows you to send private tweets, better storage and allows for creating a friend list to send files to. The friend list isn’t a complete list of your Twitter followers.

PROS: Easy to use and share files with a simple one step process.

CONS: You don’t get a link to your file unless you go to your Twitter stream and find the tweet. The registered version doesn’t pull in all your friends and doesn’t give you the option to add friends that are missing.

RATING:

 

TwitDoc uses the Twitter OAuth to log you into their account. You can upload up videos up to 25MB, documents up to 15MB and photos up to 10MB. I’m not sure why they are using different file sizes for each type of file. Once you’ve uploaded your file and sent your tweet, you get a TinyURL, which links to a page where you file is. It’s a simple site that gives you the ability to share files quickly and easily. There is also a downloadable client that allows you to use the site’s features from your desktop.

PROS: Easy to use single function site.

CONS: There is no list of all the files you upload. You can’t control the files once they are uploaded if you don’t have the URL. It doesn’t handle audio files.

RATING:

 

Acamin is designed with a nod to the academic community. That doesn’t mean it’s limited to that field. You can post files to your Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn account. I tried adding a picture and was given a series of error messages before finally being told that my image was posted to my Twitter account. When I clicked on the URL to link back to the image, I got a “This file is not available!” error message. According to the icons on the page, you can attach a file to an email, publish it online, get the code to embed your file and convert it to a pdf.

PROS: The ability to publish files on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, as well as being able to convert documents to a pdf file.

CONS: It doesn’t work. I counted at least six error messages before the site attempted to send the file, then got another error message after posting.

RATING:

Conclusion: TwitFS and FileTweet did the best with TwitFS ultimately having the best features. It’s simple to use, accepts the largest files and allows you to share the file across multiple networks. Best of all, it works without any problems. FileTweet is good for a quick send if you don’t care about sending the file again or being able to delete it from the site’s servers. FileSocial is also recommended for it’s ability to view the files without having to download them.  

Stefan Halley is the Digital Project Leader for The Duffy Agency. He loves to talk about social media and won't shut up about Twitter.

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Is console gaming becoming social media?

My earliest gaming memory is sitting in my living room playing Contra with my brother and wreaking serious 8 bit havoc while mom made grilled cheese sandwiches. That was what social console gaming meant through the 80’s and 90’s – playing a game with someone sitting beside you in the privacy of your home. But social networking’s ever expanding reach has utterly changed the face of console gaming, turning your living room into a global venue. 

 

Thanks to consoles going online, these days you’re not confined to just playing games with people in your living room. Gamers started competing online a long time ago, but consoles are now going beyond gaming and become bonafide social media tools. Via the plastic box in their living rooms, gamers today establish new lifelong friendships, stay in touch with old friends, and sometimes even find a husband or wife and make babies.

The social expansion continues. A few days ago, Microsoft launched a major update to Xbox Live - the online platform for the Xbox 360. You can now connect to Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm and the Zune marketplace. So if you want to find someone to play a game with or check out what people are saying about new releases, or just Tweet about how sweet Left for Dead 2 is, you can do so seamlessly. And if you’re tired of gaming, you can check out playlists on Last.fm or stream a movie in HD.

Launched a couple years ago, the PS3’s Home is now really starting to hit its stride with more users and developers getting involved. Similar to Second Life, you enter the world as your avatar and walk around meeting other gamers, finding people to either play a match against or just have a chat. You can also check out movie trailers at the theater, play mini-games like bowling and can buy and decorate a house. This Sims like experience is sure to have staying power as it blends in with the overall gaming experience.

The other big console, the Nintendo Wii, is great fun for groups of real-life people, but as far as online capability goes it’s still in the stone age compared to what Microsoft and Sony have accomplished.

Console gaming hit something of a rut for a while in terms of breakthroughs, as the only major progress they made was having prettier graphics. But with the introduction of social networking, the possibilities are limitless, both from developers with big budgets creating new interactive platforms and users generating their own content. And with the expansion into social media, you know marketers won’t be far behind. Red Bull and Audi already have a presence in Home, and Kia ran a campaign on Xbox Live. And why not? It’s another great media channel for marketers to get creative in and deliver highly relevant content.

It’s an exciting time to be tethered to a box. Where do you think the future of the console is heading?

Jason Ross is a copywriter for The Duffy Agency. He loves working on both traditional and social media projects and speculating on the future of the ad industry. 

The 10 funniest videos about Twitter

Welcome to Twitter Tuesday. Every Tuesday we will post about Twitter. Stop by for advice and how to's for marketing professionals. Every other week we will post our AppQuest Edition featuring a review of twitter applications. 

As much as we love Twitter, we can’t deny that the idea of it, and the way many people use it, is pretty ridiculous. You folks out there on the Internet have noticed as well and have let the world know how you see Twitter through the magic of video. And some of them are downright hilarious. Here are my top 10 funniest videos about Twitter.

10. We start off with a good old fashioned rant.

9. What would the world be like if people on the street talked like they Tweet? One man goes on a mission to find out.

8. Just when you thought the Twitter craze was subsiding, it’s back… with a vengeance.

7. It’s amazing what you can get away with when you have incriminating evidence against your boss.

6. Breaking news from The Onion! Parents using Twitter, Facebook to stalk their children.

5. Amir explains to his friend Jake that Twitter is a place to store your secrets.

4. Twitter gets the Hitler treatment as it becomes part of the internet phenomenon of subtitling the Hitler rant from the film “Downfall.” Hitler is sad because his doggy died, and angry because Twitter is down again.

3. Has the world gone mad, or is everyone just saying everything they think and do out loud? Wait, what’s the difference?

2. Celebrity Twitter Overkill: when Ashton Kutcher becomes more important than news. And everything else.

1. And the very best video poking fun at Twitter out there in cyberspace is… William Shatner reading Sarah Palin’s Tweets as poetry! I wish there was a better cut of this as the actual reading is framed by talk show host babble (no offense Conan), but the performance by the former captain of the starship Enterprise is gold.

Jason Ross is a copywriter for The Duffy Agency. He loves working on both traditional and social media projects and speculating on the future of the ad industry. 

We are our own Big Brother

New developments in social media and technology make more and more of your private life public

Social media offers up a way for people to express themselves in ways never possible, but like Uncle Ben told a young Peter Parker, “With great power comes great responsibility.”  Information that used to be difficult or impossible to find, people now freely offer up. Over the course of this week, my Internet prowling unearthed some new trends that made me wonder if social media wasn’t starting to ask me to put too much of my life out in the public domain.

We can now make it easier than ever for people stalk and track us. Check out the new SenseCam. This little gadget is designed to capture pretty much every aspect of your life on camera. You wear it around your neck and its fisheye lens takes a picture every 30 seconds. It’s easy to see the appeal – there’s potential for a whole lot of wonderful images and moments from your life to be captured that would otherwise be missed if you hands are otherwise occupied.




Somehow the thought of a whole lot of people walking around with these things taking automated pictures all the time makes me just a little uneasy.

Now combine that with SoundBiter, a new iPhone app that constantly records the world around it. This nifty little app constantly records all audio around you. If you hear something you want to share, you hit a button and the phone saves the last 60 seconds of audio. You can then instantly send it out to the world via Twitter.

This could be a fun party app but the potential for paparazzi to exploit celebrities they are stalking or for people to be quoted out of context means there is great damage it could do.

Another trend that’s taking advantage of technology’s watchful eye are location based services (LBS) like the new Google Latitude. Thanks to built-in GPS, most new phones know where you are all the time . Developers are creating apps to show you nearby locations of people in your network.

With automated alerts when someone you know is close by, don’t be surprised if your friends suddenly start popping up a lot more often when you’re out and about.

As if that wasn’t enough ways to expose ourselves, here is my personal favorite. This new scale guilts you into losing weight by Tweeting how heavy you are automatically when you step on it. The Internet has officially invaded your bathroom.

The brilliance of social media and technology is that it you can share your life with people in ways never before possible. If you want to stay in the loop, putting a whole lot of yourself out there is inevitable. After all, that’s the spirit of social media. But the question is how much should we share? Is the rapid advancement in social media technologies putting too much of our lives online? Perhaps, but these gadgets sure do look cool.

Jason Ross is a copywriter for The Duffy Agency. He loves working on both traditional and social media projects and speculating on the future of the ad industry. 

Polling Twitter

 Welcome to Twitter Tuesday. Every Tuesday we will post about Twitter. Stop by for advice and how to's for marketing professionals. Every other week we will post our AppQuest Edition featuring a review of Twitter applications.

 

What’s the best way to get feedback from Twitter?

If you’re using Twitter for your brand, at some point you’re probably going to want to understand how your followers feel about your brand, service or product. Polling is an excellent way to get a quick understanding of how people feel. It’s also a great way to run a contest, get demographic information on your followers, or get a rating on an idea. There are several sites that do just this. Their features range from only one service to a wide variety of services with a slight service fee.

I sat down with my co-workers and created a wish-list of qualities that we as marketing people want in a Twitter polling service. Of course, all the apps have to be free and require no downloadable client. Beyond that, we wanted to be able to:

• have an easy-to-use interface
• get the hang of it quickly
• have a unique url
• use analytics
• use multiple types of polls
• insert images
• brand polls
• make them visually interesting
• tag keywords
• categorize topics
• leave a message
• embed on our site

The evaluation method was simple. I visited each site and registered. After my profile loaded, I took a screenshot of the interface and then spent about ten minutes looking around the site. A decent site should be able to explain itself in that time. After using the application, I rated each site against my wish list.

Polls.tw is one of the simpler polling sites. You ask the question and then enter the multiple choice answers below. Polls.tw will post a short URL to Twitter. You login to Twitter using OAuth to track your results. It also allows you to leave a comment. That’s it. It could have been so much more with a bit of work.

PROS: Easy to use and creates a poll that can be easily used by others.

CONS: It only creates one type of poll: multiple choice. All the other sites do the same thing but offer a lot more features.

RATING:

Poll Your Followers is another extremely simple to use site to create surveys/polls on Twitter. You can create either yes/no questions or multiple choice. Poll Your Followers pops up when you first view a Twitter profile. This is great if you ever go to that person’s profile, but if you use a third party site to access Twitter, you’ll never see the poll. You also get a short URL to the poll for retweeting and sharing with others.

PROS: Easy to use for short multiple choice polls.

CONS: Outside of posting a poll, it has no other functions. You can’t leave any feedback or find out who voted in your poll. This is another site that needs a few more features to make it worth your while.

RATING:

Twttrstrm is a free tool from Squidoo. It’s one of the more interesting Twitter polling tools. You can ask any kind of question, create keywords to track, pick a category and add tags to make the poll searchable. Once you submit your question, it creates a Squidoo like lense or page that has a wide variety of functions. The new page is a standalone site that allows any Twitter user to start a discussion, ask for advice, add YouTube videos and basically create a resource for others surrounding your Twitter question. 

From their website:

Here’s the magic part: as your followers click through and respond, the storm spreads to their followers. So, in short, it’s a threaded, viral, structured conversation in the middle of the Twitter melee.

There is an abundance of information that could be added to your Twitter poll, to the point where it can be overwhelming.

PROS: Twttrstrm is easy to set up. The lense aspect is unique to Squidoo and creates an incredible resource around your questions.

CONS: It’s a mess. Looking at examples from other more established polls, it’s a hodgepodge of information that can be very difficult to sort through.

RATING:

StrawPoll is the most visually interesting of the polling sites. You can ask any question as long as it only has two possible answers. It sounds very limited, but where they succeed is in listing the answers for each side of the question which helps provide some extra insight into the answer. You get your own url that uses the background of your Twitter profile.

PRO: Of the single feature sites, I like this one the best. It’s simple to use, visually appealing and allows you to see the tweets surrounding your poll.

CONS: It’s usefulness is limited to just the one type of question. The site feels like more of a gimmick than something that a business would seriously use.

RATING:

SocialToo lets you ask multiple choice or yes/no questions and gives you a bunch of useful tools for Twitter, identi.ca, and Facebook. On Twitter you can:

• Create surveys
• Auto-follow
• Auto-unfollow
• Blacklist
• Direct Message new followers
• Receive a daily stats email

There are a lot of useful little things you can do, but beyond the basic poll creation and stat tracking you have to pay for each add on. Also, it’s pretty ugly.

PROS: Simple interface and lots of nice add-on features.

CONS: You have to pay for the add-ons and it’s not the most attractive layout.

RATING:

With 17 different question templates including multiple choice, rankings and matrices, Twtpoll gives you all the options you’ll need to gauge public opinion. It gives you a custom url and your Twitter icon appears with the poll. You can also brand your poll, but this requires a nominal fee that you choose yourself. You can also add pictures to go along with each answer option, making the poll more visually lively. Once you start getting results, you can view them in pie charts, bar charts and tables. The only downside is that there’s no option to ad keywords.

PROS: Lots of question types, has a clean and simple look and it’s easy to spread your poll around.

CONS: Branding must be paid for and it lacks keyword tags.

RATING:

Poll Everywhere has the most polished offer of all the sites. But there’s a big catch: if you plan on getting more than 30 responses to your question, you have to pay them. The coolest thing about Poll Everywhere is that it’s mobile – respondents can send in answers via text message and the results update in real time in your browser or in a PowerPoint presentation. So this is a great tool if you want to give a presentation where the audience can text in responses to your poll and have the results displayed without missing a beat. The reports it generates are also more advanced than the other sites.

It’s not a bad deal if you need software to interact with an audience. Otherwise, you can get the functionality you need for free elsewhere.

PROS: Instant stats gathered from phones make it an ideal audience polling tool.  It also generates professional reports.

CONS: Price tag not worth paying if you just want to send your poll out through Twitter or other social media channels.

RATING:

 

CONCLUSION: While there are some sites that are easy to use, one trick ponies, it’s worth putting a little extra effort into your polls with the sites that offer more functionality. Twtpoll edges out Twttrstrm as it provides nearly all the features we wanted while still being simple to use and visually appealing.

Stefan Halley is the Digital Project Leader for The Duffy Agency. He loves to talk about social media and won't shut up about Twitter.

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U2 and Foo Fighters usher in new era of interactive concerts

There’s no question the Internet has changed the way we consume music. Digital downloads have become a staple of our lives, but digital concerts? Is experiencing your favorite band perform live being claimed by the ever expanding Internet as well?

I don’t see bands ever forsaking the road, but they are starting to embrace the concept of concert via fiber optic cable as a way to get closer to their fans. Two weeks ago, U2 played a concert in the Rose Bowl which was simultaneously broadcast by YouTube to millions of viewers across 16 countries. It was a first for the world’s largest video provider, and, unsurprisingly, it was a major success. After all, what U2 fan wouldn’t go to the trouble of simply clicking a link from the comfort of their living room?

The roughly 10 million fans who tuned in were able to chat with each other via an integrated Twitter feed, many of whom simply posted thank you’s to the band. Never one to miss an opportunity to save the world, Bono slipped in a “donate to (RED)” button for the millions of viewers to contemplate clicking while in their happy spirits over the free show.

The event was another demonstration of traditional media’s decline in prominence. Those 10 million viewers showed up with zero promotion carried out in traditional media – the concert was promoted exclusively online. And while those numbers are pretty far off what the big network TV broadcasts get, it’s a major jump forward in seriously competing with them.

U2’s Internet extravaganza was well publicized and hard to miss, but did you catch Foo Fighters pulling an Internet first of their own last weekend? The alt-rockers broadcast a live show on Facebook (via livestream), becoming the first major act to do so. Even without much promotion, the 2 hour and 45 minute stream from their recording studio drew in 440,000 viewers.

The band played fan favorites in support of their newly released greatest hits album. During the show, fans were able to talk not only with each other, but with the band themselves who responded to comments and took requests. Imagine having that opportunity with your favorite band.

So are streaming concerts the wave of the future? Perhaps, but probably not the near future. The rights issues around concerts are far more complicated than broadcasting other media, as there are so many people who need to sign off on the project including managers, band members, the record label, the venue, etc. But the technology is there, the demand is there and there is money to be made, so expect the likes of Bono and Dave Grohl to be invading your living room more often in the coming years.

Jason Ross is a copywriter for The Duffy Agency. He loves working on both traditional and social media projects and speculating on the future of the ad industry. 

One big dysfunctional twamily

Welcome to Twitter Tuesday. Every Tuesday we will post about Twitter. Stop by for advice and how to's for marketing professionals. Every other week we will post our AppQuest Edition featuring a review of twitter applications.

How to recognize 15 types of tweeters

With millions of people around the world tweeting like mad, Twitter can seem a bit chaotic when you first jump in. But when you’ve been entrenched for a while and have a few tweets, RTs and @s under your belt, you’ll start noticing patterns in your Twitter feed. Twitter attracts many users who have very specific goals in mind – some good, some bad, and some just plain weird. Here are 15 different types of people in your extended twamily that are out there in large numbers. See if you can spot one of each among the tweeple you follow.

The suit
AKA the self-proclaimed social media guru, this ambitious tweeter usually has a corporate/marketing background and is CEO of some company they just made up. Most of these ‘visionaries’ with their can’t-be-missed offers are little more than con artists, but there are a few diamonds in the rough who really know what they’re talking about.

The n00b
N00bs can be the most frustrating - and the most entertaining. They have yet to grasp how Twitter works. When you see someone treating Twitter like a big, open chatroom, you’ve got a n00b.

The brand
Some companies get what Twitter is all about and use it to genuinely connect with their customers. Starbucks and Zippo have used Twitter to great effect, much to the appreciation of their followers. Others are little better than spammers, blasting their followers with offers and deals. In other words, all the stuff that ends up in a junk mail folder in your email.

The Twitterati
These monoliths of the twitterverse have risen from anonymity to become the idols of tens of thousands of followers who they’ve never met and whose names they couldn’t possibly remember. Some are deserving of their social media tycoon status, others not so much. At any rate, don’t expect to be followed back or respond to messages, their egos tend to be just a little over-inflated.

The celeb
Though there are a slew of fake celebrity accounts, the real ones are out there. Among the more interesting are Shaquille O’neal and Barrack Obama. Again, don’t expect much of a response from the bigger celebs. But the B-listers have been known to be fairly open. 

The newsie
If you’re on Twitter a lot, you’ll notice that breaking news comes across the Twitter waves faster than it appears in mainstream media. There are loads of regular people who love to race to break news to all their followers, but you can also follow proper news organizations on Twitter to get up-to-the second info on what’s happening in the world, like CNN, BreakingNewsON and fark.

The lurker
Every type of online community has its fair share of lurkers. You’ll find these users cowering in dark corners, eyeballing the updates of their many followers while rarely contributing anything themselves. Because, you know, they don’t have anything as important as Steve’s last update (eating yummy donuts, nom nom nom) to add the conversation.

The bot
When a spammer can’t be bothered to cut and paste their tweets 30 times a day, a bot does it for them. Thankfully, if you make the mistake of following one all it takes is a simple unfollow to be rid of them.

The guy stuck on repeat
Everything they have to say, they say over and over again. You know, just in case you missed it the first ten times. This may also be a symptom of a n00b who doesn’t understand how Twitter works or a spammer who is just trying to increase traffic to their website.

Mr Mundane
Like Steve and his donut eating mentioned above, many people feel compelled to tell the world inane details about what they happen to be doing at any given moment. Why they believe anyone cares that they are drinking coffee or thinking about what to have for lunch is a mystery that continues to elude the world’s top scientists.

The ‘everyone look how deep I am’ tweeter
This one is characterized by their deep, student councilor-like insights into life and the universe like, ‘today is the first day of the rest of your life.’ You may be saying to yourself, that’s not deep, it’s over-used drivel. You’ll be saying that a lot.

The whiner
Chronic complainers love Twitter because it lets them greatly expand the number of people they can tell how bad everything is at once. Always a good source for your daily bring-me-down.

The RT junkie
Retweeting is a great way to share interesting links and videos. But some people go overboard and post almost nothing but RTs. If you notice a friend with this addiction, stage an intervention and get them to add something of their own to the conversation.

The collector
This person’s mission in life is to gather as many followers as possible, as though reaching 1,000,000 twitter followers will grant them eternal life or make them an international celebrity. You don’t find this one, this one finds you. Beware, as they don’t usually have much of anything interesting to say.

The siren
There are endless amounts of beautiful young women who want to be your friend. Hard to believe, right? It’s too good to be true in reality, and it’s too good to be true on Twitter. Still, girls do manage to get hoards of followers by showing some skin and singing a tempting song to all the suckers out there. Do your best to avoid crashing on those rocks, these sirens aren’t worth following.

Which of the tweeple drive you crazy?

Jason Ross is a copywriter for The Duffy Agency. He loves working on both traditional and social media projects and speculating on the future of the ad industry.