Don'T Hide Behind Your Direct Messages When Using Social Media

I am getting so much inspiration today from #Twitter and FB re how to help people navigate and use Social Media in a positive and productive way.

One example is concerning Twitter. So many people struggle on what do on Twitter, what to tweet, what not to tweet.

My success on Twitter, if you can call it success is that I have over 5,000 people who want to connect with me, chat with me, ask me questions and generally we get to know each other. It has been called - engaging with each other.

Quite simply put it's not much different than real life, you just have to think about how you like to be treated and treat people in the same way.

One tip I would offer is:

When you notice someone following you check out their profile, and if you feel you do not want to follow them, that is OK.
But, and here is the bit a lot of people will not like - do not DM them ( private message) and sell yourself, or attempt to. This is quite rude. Mainly because they cannot respond in private message.

If you are confident in your sales skills, proud of your products and services why hide what you have to say or sell in a DM, especially when you have a captive audience, who do not have the right to respond in the same way?

If you think about it I guarantee you will not be regarded in a positive way, in fact you might well lose followers:(