Twitter – Are You a Conscious or Stream of Consciousness Tweeter?

As I was scanning through my recent Twitter sent tweets stream, I realized how much of it was reacting to stimuli in my environment: other people’s tweets, the weather, or what I was doing that day.

It was also laced with tweets with information I wanted my followers to notice. These were often scheduled in advance so I wouldn’t forget and so that they would appear in my tweet stream when my followers were most likely to notice and make use of them.

I realized there are two distinct styles of posting tweets on Twitter: conscious and stream of consciousness. Conscious tweets are deliberate. You are consciously posting this information to communicate your ideas, expertise, calls to action, etc. Conversely, stream of consciousness tweets are usually reactionary. They’re about what’s happening right now in your world and usually how you feel about it.

So is one better than the other?

If all you do is consciously post tweets that are not replies or retweets (similar to forwarded email, but for tweets of others), you are not in dialog with anyone. I think the most glaring offenders are the ”quoters,” people who post quotes, usually those of famous people and not their own. Is it okay once in a while? Sure. But please use with restraint and maybe tell us why it speaks to you.

However, if all you do is empty your stream of consciousness onto your Twitter stream, what value is that to your followers? Would probably only work if you were Jesus Christ… maybe Einstein. (Imagine what their Twitter streams would have been!)

The main point of this discussion is that you mix up both conscious and stream of consciousness posts to Twitter to round out your Twitter persona and appear to be a real human being that people will want to follow.

Tags: Social Media, Twitter