How to make friends on Twitter
How to make friends on Twitter
My friends, mostly from school, are consistently surprised when I mention that I regularly meet up in person with people from Twitter. In fact, I find that I’m much more likely to have a great conversation with someone I met on Twitter, compared to someone I meet for the first time at an in-person event.
Why is Twitter so great for meeting people?
There’s a much larger pool of people on Twitter than at an in-person event in your area. You’re more likely to find people who share your interests, values, and personality traits.
By the time you speak face-to-face (video or IRL) with someone, you’ve likely followed each other for a while and have some shared context. This makes the first conversation flow better.
The Twitter algorithm tries very hard to present you with tweets and people who will engage you. Real life doesn’t do that.
Most importantly: You’re more likely to find people who stretch your perception of what’s possible—people who are different from you along axes you never even considered. I consistently meet people on Twitter who make me think “Wait, you can do that?” Every month, my life gets weirder, and I love it.
Now that I’ve sold you on using Twitter, here are some tips:
I think being a real-name real-face account tends to engender a higher level of trust than an anon account.
A huge number of accounts are low-quality or bad-faith. Don’t engage if in doubt.
Use the muted words feature. You’re not here for politics.
Try to be supportive when replying (see @visakanv’s post: practice good reply game) (actually, you should probably read all of his posts)
Feel free to DM people; all my close Twitter friendships started when one of us felt like talking more. Don’t get upset if people don’t reply—it’s usually not about you.
There’s a certain stigma around being a “reply guy,” who replies too much to a particular person’s tweets. Would you text someone you don’t know very well every day? No? Good. It’s completely OK to do it every so often though.
Go forth and tweet!! Say hi: @ftlsid.