Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work

Rachel Thompson|January 31, 2013|

People who only live tweet are steadfast that the Twitter Police will arrest you if you don’t only interact live.

Okay, kidding…kinda. Yet many of these people are quite zealous in preaching to people that if they schedule in ANYTHING AT ALL, they are DOING IT WRONG. I disagree and here’s why: live tweet or not

 

As someone who makes a living helping people learn how to do social media and book marketing (in additional to writing and publishing my own books), I spend a good majority of my day on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Goodreads, LinkedIn, and Pinterest for both personal and business reasons. Therefore, it’s important that I learned early on how to manage my time best for my clients, so I’d still have time to write, be a mom, and ya know, eat Nutella.

There’s been a debate on Twitter and Facebook for years about what’s ‘better:’ live interaction only, live interaction combined with some scheduling, or scheduling only. Some people (who will most likely respond in comments here), will scold someone for scheduling, as if it’s the eighth deadly sin.

I’m personally a fan of the middle option and I’ll explain why below. Let’s now, however, deconstruct the pros and cons of all three options.

 

LIVE INTERACTION ONLY

Pros: One the advantages of only live tweeting (or FBing, or any live-ing thing) is that you can be involved in conversations as they happen. Breaking news, popular trending topics, etc. Totally true. In addition, Twitter is the great equalizer. You can speak with anyone, from writers to musicians to celebs to politicians (if that’s your thing) as you see interesting things in your feed. You can also thank people for sharing your tweet or FB message as they do it. Also, if you’re at an event, live tweeting is essential and fun to help spread the word and connect with others. 

Cons: In my experience, if you only live tweet, it’s hard to be ‘on’ all the time. Most people don’t have the time to stay on Twitter (or Facebook) full time so you miss a lot (unless you go back through and search for something specific to comment on). People also miss what you have to say.

Also, if someone comes to your stream (or page) and sees a bunch of ‘Thank you for the RT’ tweets, it’s boring. They have no real idea if you’re cool, interesting, or what. That’s why I use Pluggio to spread them out.

I also find that using something to schedule in tweets/shares, etc (I prefer Hootsuite) helps me address a number of my keywords and topics and spread them out also. Sure, I’ll go on a Nutella riff, but that’s not ALL I want to talk about (okay, it is but you know. Girl’s gotta make a living.).

 

 

COMBINATION OF LIVE TWEETING AND SCHEDULING 

Pros: You can better manage not only your time but also your followers. If you spread your tweets out throughout the day, people can check in when it’s convenient for them, and you can schedule in posts that tie to your interests. I find planning ahead to do things like: share fellow writers’ posts, memes (like #MondayBlogs, #WW or #FF), and promotional events work better when I’ve scheduled in the posts. Then I can live tweet any responses.

Cons: If you schedule in articles or current event tweets, you can be easily burned when something happens and your scheduled tweet is inappropriate (this has happened frequently this past year with some large companies who should know better). This is why I only schedule a day or so ahead of time, and I choose topics that aren’t dependent on the current social climate (that I save for live tweets).

 

SCHEDULING ONLY 

Pros: You set and forget, which makes it easy to focus on other things, like making money, family, cleaning your house, making your martini…whatever.

Cons: Fairly obvious, as mentioned above. I’ve struggled with scheduling in pertinent articles (no more than one every 4 hours), because once you set it and forget it, you realize that many of these articles have quickly become dated (for example, I scheduled in a bunch of Twitter articles over the holidays, and some are just surfacing now, which is embarrassing). Clearly, a mistake on my part and something I’m much more on top of now.

Also, you can come across as quite robot-like, which is diametrically opposed to the concept of ‘social’ media, since many of these tweets contain links. (According to Twitter’s spam guidelines, tweets should consist primarily of personal updates, not link after link after link.)

 

Listen, here’s what I love the most about Twitter (or any social media platform): you curate it for what works best for you. If you’re not getting the results you want, change it up. Read some stuff. Learn. Nobody has a right to tell you what to do (unless you’re doing something that is against guidelines like putting a link in every tweet or spamming your wall with coupons and such). I encourage you to look closely at what you share, pay attention to the ‘rules’ provided by each channel, and figure out what works for you.

 

I’d love your feedback and opinions on this controversial subject below.

 

If you want to follow me on my author website, go to RachelintheOC.com for my latest blog posts, book info, and guest posts by some fabulous author friends. If you haven’t yet, please check out my third release, Broken Pieces, on Amazon (no Kindle required — they have free apps). Out less than six weeks, it’s received over 38 5-star reviews. 

‘Broken Pieces left me in tears. It left me raw – the wounds still chafe, but it left me astounded at the courage Rachel Thompson had shown in writing this book, in breaking taboos, in speaking out and in refusing to use her pain and hurt as excuses to hide behind for the rest of her life.

This is a book about rising above; about becoming more than you can possibly believe you ever will be at those terribly low points of your life. It is about surviving, thriving and living and I recommend it more than any other book I have read.’ ~ from Tracy Riva, Top Amazon Reviewer. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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69 Comments

  1. Rachel Thompson (@BadRedheadMedia) on January 31, 2013 at 12:31 pm

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    Reply
  2. Rachel Thompson (@RachelintheOC) on January 31, 2013 at 1:36 pm

    Why Live-Only Tweeting Doesn’t Work http://t.co/BeSjfehb via @BadRedheadMedia Please read first, then respond. thx!

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  19. Melissa McPhail (@melissagmcphail) on February 1, 2013 at 8:15 am

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  21. Rachel Thompson (@BadRedheadMedia) on February 1, 2013 at 11:15 am

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  22. Becky Gaylord (@BeckyGaylord) on February 1, 2013 at 12:10 pm

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  29. Rachel Thompson (@RachelintheOC) on February 2, 2013 at 6:35 pm

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  31. Kim Lavigne (@Freedomwalker77) on February 3, 2013 at 12:36 am

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  32. Claire Jarrett (@clairejarrett) on February 3, 2013 at 7:21 am

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  36. Steve Cassady (@SteveCassady) on February 3, 2013 at 11:23 pm

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  37. Michele Welch (@Michele_Welch) on February 4, 2013 at 1:30 am

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  39. Rachel Thompson (@BadRedheadMedia) on February 4, 2013 at 4:30 am

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  40. RachelintheOC (@BkPromoCentral) on February 4, 2013 at 5:10 am

    #MondayBlogs Why Live-Only Tweeting Doesn’t Work http://t.co/cLZ62gHG via @BadRedheadMedia Please read first, then respond. thx!

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  41. @vividsynthesis on February 4, 2013 at 6:38 am

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  42. Rachel Thompson (@BadRedheadMedia) on February 4, 2013 at 7:31 am

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  43. RachelintheOC (@MondayBlogs) on February 4, 2013 at 7:45 am

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  44. Amanda Taylor on February 4, 2013 at 7:55 am

    I like to do the combo thing. I come in to check 2-3 times a day to check and post. When I got my smartphone I downloaded a couple apps to respond to DMs, mentions, or PMs. I get on every day and schedule on a daily basis unless I know I am going to be gone a couple days in a internet deadzone I schedule in advance and let people know ahead of time. That’s what seems to work best for me especially since I write and do things outdoors!

    Reply
    • Rachel Thompson on February 4, 2013 at 12:01 pm

      I agree, the combo thing works best. It’s funny when people get mad and bossy about how twitter SHOULD be — it’s a free platform we all use for different reasons. Sure, there are guidelines but still, it works best when we work it how we like.

      thx for the comments, Amanda!

      Reply
  45. Rachel Thompson (@RachelintheOC) on February 4, 2013 at 9:30 am

    #MondayBlogs Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/EY9TgvHd by @BadRedheadMedia #sm

    Reply
  46. Rachel Thompson (@BadRedheadMedia) on February 4, 2013 at 10:35 am

    #MondayBlogs Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/DxeavuTi by @BadRedheadMedia #sm

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  47. Bublish (@BublishMe) on February 4, 2013 at 11:00 am

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  48. CarolynNicanderMohr (@wonderoftech) on February 4, 2013 at 12:33 pm

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  49. @MikeRocheAuthor on February 4, 2013 at 12:54 pm

    Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/IU6DyJgv

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  50. Rachel Thompson (@RachelintheOC) on February 4, 2013 at 3:15 pm

    #MondayBlogs To Schedule or Not To Schedule? I say YES: Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/ukrY8PwM

    Reply
  51. Jen Brass Jenkins (@chrliechaz) on February 4, 2013 at 3:48 pm

    Totally agree with this>>Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/0zJ23VYN via @badredheadmedia #MondayBlogs

    Reply
  52. TheJackB (@TheJackB) on February 4, 2013 at 8:31 pm

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  53. Rachel Thompson (@BadRedheadMedia) on February 4, 2013 at 8:55 pm

    #MondayBlogs To Schedule or Not To Schedule? I say YES: Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/EQd2z2df

    Reply
  54. @adriennewarren5 on February 4, 2013 at 9:51 pm

    Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/HzsqCeIF via @RachelintheOC

    Reply
  55. Louie Baur (@louiebaur) on February 5, 2013 at 1:59 am

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  56. Ryan Casey (@RyanCaseyBooks) on February 5, 2013 at 9:45 am

    Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work via @badredheadmedia – http://t.co/UhXIkmxx

    Reply
  57. @lauraacedo on February 5, 2013 at 1:39 pm

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    Reply
  58. 10 Things I Wish I Had Known About Being An Author on February 6, 2013 at 11:26 am

    […] « Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work […]

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  59. Rachel Thompson (@RachelintheOC) on February 10, 2013 at 7:35 am

    Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/XNU1SGZy via @BadRedheadMedia #amreading

    Reply
  60. @LucindaLitNYC on February 12, 2013 at 1:16 pm

    Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/2BtTpHP1 #socialmedia

    Reply
  61. IndieBookPromos (@indiebookpromos) on February 18, 2013 at 10:40 am

    #MondayBlogs Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/cX4DjH8s aka why the #Twitter police need to calm down

    Reply
  62. RachelintheOC (@MondayBlogs) on February 18, 2013 at 12:25 pm

    #MondayBlogs Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/src8kMjM aka why the #Twitter police need to calm down

    Reply
  63. Rachel Thompson (@BadRedheadMedia) on February 18, 2013 at 3:20 pm

    #MondayBlogs Why Live-Only Interaction on Social Media Doesn’t Work http://t.co/EjbdZbL9 aka why the #Twitter police need to calm down

    Reply
  64. @katiiisays on March 3, 2013 at 12:15 pm

    Why Live-Only Interaction on #SocialMedia Doesn’t Work via @BadRedheadMedia http://t.co/7FQqlPt6l4

    Reply
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