You probably grew up hearing such phrases as, “Keep your elbows off the table”, or “Make sure that you say please and thank you”. We teach manners to our children ourselves from the time that they are old enough to understand what we are talking about. Good manners are appreciated and often expected in today’s society and it is no different within the virtual world.
What’s Wrong With my Manners?
Maybe nothing is. Or maybe every one of your tweets just screams, “Faux pas!” Are you one of those people who always write with the caps lock on just because it is easier? Do you firmly believe that a period is only for a hockey game? Or are you one of these types: “A comma?” “What’s a comma?” In that case, it’s going to be a pretty safe bet that Miss Emily Post will not be asking you for input on manners.
Now That’s Rude.
Okay, so not everyone realizes that when you type in all capitals, you are in effect shouting at people. Now you do, so don’t do it anymore. You may think that it makes what you have to say easier to read and more noticeable, when in fact, it simply gives the reader an instant headache.
If your recent post went something like this, ” I went to bed in the morning I fed the dog” take a second and reread that. Did you go to bed in the morning, or did you feed the dog in the morning? Twitter is restricted to only 140 characters per post but you want people to know what you are trying to say. Throw in some punctuation!
Retweeting Manners
Auto retweet or automatic retweets are great in some cases and they have their uses. However, you generally don’t even see these tweets until sometime later. For all you are aware of, you have just used automatic retweet for a post that is screaming, or one that makes no sense. That is one drawback of the auto retweet option. When you are manually retweeting, at least you can choose not to retweet if you feel the post is bad taste or has bad manners.
Your aim on Twitter is to grow your followers and have them read your tweets. They will be more likely to do this if etiquette is properly followed.