I sent a tweet earlier today highlighting the fact that Twitter has finally launched something that has been widely rumored, promoted accounts.
Moments later, @MitsuYamazaki, someone I met while speaking at a conference last week sent the following reply,
“@ryanshell u can always set up “SHADY” auto follow to gain more followers… what’s the difference?”
Maybe it’s just me, but I think there’s a big difference in the promoted accounts and the shadier auto follow process Mitsu referenced.
Why?
Promoted accounts will show up in the “Suggestions for You” section and allow users to proactively follow said accounts. Doing so offers no guarantee of a follow in return and the motivation for the follow is likely that of common interests.
On the other hand, the auto follow method Mitsu referred to is simply a way to game the system. Here’s part of what I previously said in a blog post on this topic,
“There are programs that exist that allow users to mass follow people based on location, keywords and various other requirements. Once the criteria is set they then hit the “magic” follow button and hundreds, if not thousands of people can be followed all at once.
That’s only part of the game though.
Once the mass following is done there hope is that the newly followed people will politely follow the individual in return.
After X days the mass follower will fire up the program once again and unfollow any new person they followed that didn’t follow them in return. (I guess it wasn’t true love.)”
Promoted accounts are not people paying for followers, they are accounts paying for added exposure that could potentially lead to legitimate new followers.
