I recently got into a bit of an… umm… ‘altercation’ with a South Wales-based business (who shall remain nameless) via Twitter. They followed me and then sent me multiple copied and pasted @mentions basically saying: “we’ve followed you, so the least you can do is follow us back.”
I politely told them that this wasn’t a good approach to social media, to which they replied telling me that while they appreciated the feedback, they were annoyed at me for doing it in a way that was public (i.e. not via DM or email instead). I informed them that in a social media space, others wouldn’t afford them that luxury (and would be a lot harsher than I was), and reiterated that I wasn’t having a go – I was only trying to help. They then unfollowed me (charming… but quite funny).
But it’s true. I wasn’t having a go. I was trying to help. I was speaking from experience.
You see, my first ever online marketing campaign – years before I got my start in SEO – was for myself, as a solo musician. In early 2006 I released my first CD (Bad River, a 5-track EP) and wanted to promote it online. So I did it via the social media website I was most prominent on at the time: MySpace (my MySpace profile is still there by the way).