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3 Things That Would Improve Twitter Suggestions

July 31, 2010 By 3 Comments

Today Twitter added a new interesting feature which is common on other networks like Facebook and LinkedIn, where you are suggested who to follow. According to the twitter blog the suggestions are based on several factors, including the people you follow and the people they are following.

I find this feature very interesting, especially for twitter users who are still new and who have not yet got a hang of it. It has sometimes been difficult to find interesting people to follow that you do not know from before. At least from my experience I usually follow the writers of the blogs I read and the people that I meet in real life. I rarely sit on twitter and try to find people to follow. But maybe that is just me?

Twitter also added the feature “if you like this person, you might like these as well”. Interesting, but I wonder what will happen if it starts suggesting organisations and people that you don’t want to be associated with.

Anyway, in the right menu you can see the users suggested, and you can also press “view all” and see come to a new page where you see a longer list of suggested people. In the right menu you get to see their name and a picture and have the option to follow them in directly from the right menu. Most of the time these features are in beta when they are first published, so they might have more coming on this one. But here are three things which I would like to see in the feature which would make me use it even more.

1. Tweeter rollover – displaying; location, latest tweet, bio, followers, website etc.

In the “normal” feed you can get more information about the tweeter by rolling you mouse over his/hers screen name, this I feel is very useful when you want more info about the person you are following. This is even more important I feel when it comes to people that you are not following and that you might want to learn more about to follow. If I’m going to follow someone by pressing follow in the right menu, I want this info there as well.

2. The reason – why should I follow this person?

Twitter says that the suggestions are based on several factors, I want to know which one. Am I recommended this person because we live in the same city? Or because my friend follow her? Or is it because she tweets about the same subjects as I do? I think this information would make me more interested in following this person.

3. Variables – give me an option to choose what people to are shown – perhaps depending on language.

I rarely, or almost never follow people because they are from the same city as me or live close to me. So I would like the option to turn of that factor. On the other hand I love to listen to people who tweet about social media, marketing and business development, so then I would be nice to have the option to be suggested people two tweet a lot about this keywords.

So far the best thing with this feature, if it works, is that if you “click “hide,” and we’ll try not to suggest that user again.” However, could this could be bad if you click it unintentionally and cannot find the person again.

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  • http://twitter.com/AnnelieNaes AnnelieNaes

    Just posted: 3 Things That Would Improve Twitter Suggestions http://bit.ly/9z4J5M

    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://twitter.com/AlexanderHold Alexander Hold

    Interesting Post. However I was wondering if Twitter was a successful media, or just waist of time? I do have a twitter profile, and update it with micro blogs from time to time, but I just never seem to get any respond or any visits to my website. So is there even a reason for spending time on twitter, and isn't facebook just much more valuable. As I see it I gain a lot of trafic from my facebook to my website http://alexanderhold.com . But non from Twitter.

  • http://www.annelienaes.com Annelie Näs

    I think twitter can be very successful when you know how to “use” it right. Depending on how you use facebook there is a big difference. Most people, like me, only connect with people they have meet in real life on Facebook, meaning that they already have a relationship to that person. So if someone post something on facebook you have some relation to the person posting. On Twitter on the other hand, you add people because you find them interesting, not necessarily because you know them. Therefore you dont have the same relation to a post in the beginning. Therefore you have to build an online-based-relationsship to people on twitter to get the same effect. Its a bit like recommendations. If a salesman says “read this” I might not, but if a friend says the samething. I'm more likley to. Don't you think?