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How to: Do a Proper Follow Friday on Twitter

February 12, 2010 by Aaron 98 Comments

What is #followfriday? Every Friday, you’ll see thousands of people on Twitter using this phrase in their tweets. So what exactly is #followfriday? Follow Friday is a way people recommend their followers in their tweets to other followers to follow on twitter. Don’t get it? Alright imagine you’re in a PARTY. There are tons of people in that party, most of them you don’t know. Maybe me you know me, then I’ll shake your hand and recommend you to my other friends (followers) in that party (twitter). I’ll tell them “Hey meet Mike, he’s a great guy! he owns three successful business”

Then my friends (followers) will get interested in knowing you and you’ll be friends (they follow you on twitter)

Here are some mistakes that you shouldn’t make.

DON’Ts

1. Recommend WITHOUT reasons.

I know that you want to recommend as many people as possible but without any reasons, nobody will look at them and consider following them.

Why you shouldn’t do this. Using the same party situation like above, imagine me shouting “hey meet these guys here” Firstly, I sound like a crazy person. Secondly there isn’t a personal touch in it.

2. Recommend everyone on your list.

Its alright to be friendly but recommending everyone on your list is not a way. First you’ll be spamming the timeline, secondly it looks spammy. Why you shouldn’t do this. Again imagine me going around the party shouting hey meet him, hey meet them, hey meet him, her and him. At first maybe people will listen. After going on for 10 minutes. Do you think anyone bother listening to me anymore?

So how do you do a proper follow friday? Some of you might have a small list of followers, some might have a bigger list of followers. Here are some methods you can use.

DOs

1. Send personal follow friday tweets

This is a proper way to do a follow friday. It has information about the person rather than just tweeting follow him, her, him, him, her, her. It gives you the information of what kind of of guy or girl they are and why you should follow them.

2. Small groups

If you have tons of followers you can use this technique. Recommend four to six people in your list and tell people why they should follow them. Its clean and it has a reason why as well.

3. Create a twitter list and call it “follow friday”

You can also create a list and call if follow friday. Since you have tons of followers it is going to be hard for you to recommend everyone on your list. However you can add them in a list and name it follow friday and ask your followers to follow the list or follow the people on the list.

Filed Under: How-To Tagged With: ff, follow friday, followfriday

About Aaron

Aaron is the owner of this social media blog and founder/writer of ShortofHeight.com, a men's fashion blog that shares style & fashion tips for short men. When he is not writing, he's finding the perfect cup of coffee. Connect with him on Facebook and Twitter.

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Comments

  1. Leo Faltin says

    January 22, 2011 at 10:23 am

    I like to answer in a way that uses the addressee somewhere within the text instead of at the beginning of my reply tweets. Thus, my reply can be read by everyone of my followers and automatically recommends my communication partner to them. By this procedure, write-only tweeps are automatically excluded.

  2. Dymestar18 says

    February 25, 2011 at 6:29 pm

    Wowzer! And I always have a tendency to do #FF’s in groups, simply because I don’t have any time during the day. So I kind of rush through it. I’ve also decided to do my Follow Friday mentions once a month this year, because it’s a big hassle to do that every week with many followers. But today, one of my followers shared this article and, after reading this, I realized it is a peeve for some people. And certain strategies do work better than others.

    Yes, I’ve done number 1 in the Dont’s section many times before, but there were also times when I did numbers 1 and 2 in the Do’s section. And the Do’s section is very beneficial, ’cause people would either thank me for mentioning them, retweet it, return the favor, or follow the very people that I’ve mentioned. That has worked compared to just listing for mentions sake. So I’ll make the effort to do that more often! 🙂

  3. HD WEBSITES says

    April 29, 2011 at 2:40 pm

    SELF PROMOTION!!! =) #followfriday @hdwebsite lol

  4. Meredith Rabil says

    April 29, 2011 at 3:09 pm

    Great post here with smart and easy Do’s and Don’ts. I am going to begin trying just one #FF and give a reason as to why. Typically, I do #FF’s for people that I made a specific connection with during the week. I have found that to be helpful because it can further the relationship.

  5. Kameel Vohra says

    May 4, 2011 at 8:15 am

    Hi Aaron, I really like the idea of asking people to follow your lists! It’s not only easier, but a constant resource for those that miss your followfriday tweet.

  6. Inkscrblr says

    May 3, 2012 at 8:40 pm

    This is what I have been doing as well.

    Impersonal lists are very boring

    Paula
    @inkscrblr
    Thriftymommastips

  7. HowNotTo says

    December 5, 2012 at 2:04 am

    Wow some of these comments were only written two years ago, I’m not as behind as I thought. @hownottogetmarr Got it.

  8. Dave says

    February 14, 2013 at 1:11 am

    Oh boy! I have been totally guilty of the “mass FF” thing! Of course, what you say about it makes perfect sense. Good call, my friend, I will take that sage advice to heart. I raise my coffee cup to you!

    Thanks! Dave

  9. Kerry Enos says

    June 7, 2013 at 11:47 pm

    You can uses TweetDeck or HootSuite to schedule your posts throughout the day. That would help to schedule some of the top people.

  10. George Taylor says

    June 10, 2013 at 5:20 am

    follow @pepejcarrie posts lots of good news on football and other sports

  11. GetMyBoat says

    July 20, 2013 at 2:13 am

    Thanks for the tips!

  12. Debi J says

    July 23, 2013 at 5:15 am

    I only just heard about these this past week (I’m slow but getting there). Gonna share this over at my blog this week so others know too!

  13. Jane Redman says

    August 26, 2013 at 4:03 am

    #FF E-learning visionaries! @Chalksy

  14. Hans Forster says

    March 17, 2014 at 9:17 pm

    That’s really a useful tip, thank you !

  15. Dave says

    October 2, 2014 at 6:22 am

    Your article is riddled with typos and errors…

  16. Lauren Martin says

    January 8, 2015 at 10:31 am

    Great suggestions. I’m updating how I do #FF and this was great! Thanks 😀 Also thinking about tying a weekly blog post into it to give people even more background on ppl before following them. 😀

  17. Jeewan Garg™ says

    June 27, 2015 at 7:52 pm

    @askaaronlee:disqus wonderful Article, But How to find the list with #followfriday or #ff

  18. Joseph Rovira says

    November 9, 2015 at 4:21 am

    I think that they are suggesting that you tweet every friday that you have a list so that others can follow that list. Personally, I would rather be added to a specific list that is related to what I tweet, than another follower. I always feel obligated to follow those that follow me and I never even look at my stream. I have content related lists with those I “follow” and actually want to read about.

« Older Comments

Trackbacks

  1. Aaron Lee says:
    March 4, 2011 at 1:00 pm

    Some tips on doing a proper #FollorFriday on twitter http://j.mp/bsjO1o

  2. Kim Sherrell says:
    March 4, 2011 at 11:44 pm

    How To Do a Proper #FollowFriday – @askaaronlee http://bit.ly/bsHmtW

  3. Adrian Slew says:
    March 5, 2011 at 2:41 am

    Some tips on doing a proper #FollorFriday on twitter http://j.mp/bsjO1o RT @askaaronlee < #FF

  4. SurveyGizmo says:
    March 5, 2011 at 2:46 am

    RT @kim How To Do a Proper #FollowFriday – @askaaronlee http://bit.ly/bsHmtW #FF

  5. Amy D. says:
    March 25, 2011 at 9:58 pm

    @Skybirdmax This is a right way to do a #FollowFriday: http://bit.ly/er7zvR

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