Too many people who see Twitter as nothing more than another venue for their marketing jump straight from the “monitoring” stage to ‘”push their message” without bothering to see whether their message is even relevant to that person’s current conversation. They hit EVERY person who mentions a keyword they’re monitoring straight away. And then wonder why they’re blocked.

This short-term thinking makes them look desperate. And it makes them look like precisely what they are: a self-centred fool who’s unpleasant to be around.

If Twitter is, as some people characterise it, a global non-stop cocktail party, then consider how you’d behave at such an event. Would you listen intently to the bubbling conversation for any and every mention of a word related to your business, then rush to that person and say “Hi, you mentioned widgets. I sell widgets!”?

Well, you might — and then people would walk away and ignore you.

No, you’d perhaps mention your business naturally in the course of conversation, perhaps first asking “So what do you do?”. You’d leave your card, and you’d leave that person with the impression that you’re a nice guy. And then, maybe months down the track, when THEY decided they needed your services, they remember you and give you a call.

While YOU may be using Twitter to market your business, it’s important to remember that everyone else is NOT there to be marketed at.