What Twitter User Are You? The Seven Twitterers

In the last couple of months I found myself using Twitter more and more as a wonderful tool to keep in touch with friends, colleagues and bloggers. Honestly, I’m using it more than what I thought, even because my Blackberry makes this even easier (thanks @socialscope!).

In this period of heavy twittering, I started understanding the world of Twitter much more, realizing that “Twitterville” can be divided into seven bery interesting categories of Twitters, easily recognizable after you spend some time paying attention to your friends’ timeline. Are you one of them?

1) Alone

This kind of users will likely be alone forever. Their typical status update is “breakfast”, “lunch”, “going out”, “dinner”, “bed”. No one will follow them and they will still be happy this way. This kind of people neither follow someone except for their girl/boyfriend wife/husband or some other close friend, so, in a nutshell, no one will ever know they exist. Let’s call them “noise”, but you’ll never “hear” it.

2) The follower

They follow everyone. As soon as they subscribe to Twitter, they look at the followers of anyone they know and follow them. This will likely lead these users to follow them back, hence it’s a great way to build a network of followers. Many of them, at this point, switch to (4) and don’t pay attention to what others are saying neither really know who the others are.

3) The connector!

According to Mr Tweet, I’m in this category. The connector is usually the person who shares lots of information on Twitter, makes Google Reader shared items be published on Twitter too, replies to others frequently and participates actively to discussions, making sure any social network they belong to is perfectly synchronized to their activity on Twitter, in order to get more visibility.

4) One Way Only

This is strictly connected to (2), but not necessarily. This kind of Twitter user basically updates his status regularly, sometimes he/she also shares a lot of useful links and information, but if you try to send him/her @ replies, asking for more information or just to comment on one of his/her tweets, you’ll never get a response. There are some of them I follow and who received many @ from me, but completely ignore what I wrote to them. Sometimes they start Twitter as (2) and, even more frequently, after being followed back they unfollow everyone, in order to “seem” more important to others (I mean, if you follow 100 people and are followed back by 15.000, look like a VIP, right?). Honestly? Sometimes I unfollow them since I don’t like this way to use Twitter.

5) The Expert

He/She’s usually a marketer who wants to promote their service/product, but not necessarily. They’re expert in using tools like Tweetdeck or Twitter Search to keep an eye to subjects they takes care of and for which they can offer their advice, for a specific business interest or just because that’s a subject they are passionate about. An example? Since I got a Blackberry Bold, I’m monitoring “blackberry bold” on Twitter in order to find useful links, applications or just to give my advice (or get advice) to people who just bought it.

6) The Spammer

They wouldn’t deserve to be mentioned, but it’s worth noting they are growing more and more so it’s important to be aware of them (and use the “pepper spray”, as someone use to say). They basically post one update only, usually containing a link. Then they start following everyone in order to make them see that link and hopefully click on it. Another name for them? Stupid fake SEO/marketing experts. Fail.

7) The Scoble

Last but not least, here is “The Scoble“. The Scoble is basically a sort of VIP Twitter user, who usually has as many followers as friends, replies very often to people who want to chat with him but it’s never enough, since he receives so many “@” messages that he cannot keep up on everything and someone would be tempted to classify him/her as (4). The Scoble is usually a connector too and, very often, he shares fresh content not shared elsewhere.

If you were creative enough, I bet you can name many other typical characters on Twitter. But before doing that, please tell me, what Twitter user are you? Leave a comment and share it!

UPDATE: thanks to pal Felipe Coimbra, here’s the Twitter Poll

Related articles by Zemanta

• Develop a Social Media System (myventurepad.com)
• Blonde 2.0 Helping You Face the World of Social Media (blonde2dot0.com)
• Long Distance Friendships Don’t Have to Suck As Much Any More… (drinkingoatmealstout.com)
• Best Month Ever for Traffic Thanks Social Media (techwag.com)
• Six Degrees of Robert Scoble (coldacid.net)

Tagged as: luca filigheddu, microblogging, Online Communities, Social network, TweetDeck, Twitter