Good-bye Twitter

A decade ago, my friend and colleague, Susan Scrupski, persuaded me to finally get with the program and start using Twitter.

At the time, Susan was already rapidly growing a social media following that would eventually contribute to her being recognized among the Twitter elite. At least one ranking authority calling her the #1 most influential woman in her category.

So, following her lead, I created my account in October 2007. It was slow at first, but eventually I settled into a pattern that became my norm for nearly ten years. Until now.

After a recent re-evaluation of the way I allocate my time and the rewards – or penalties – for doing so, I just can’t justify using it any further. So, my account is officially in long-term, suspended animation.

I’m not ready to kill it entirely; but, I don’t see any value in keeping it active anymore. Why? Well, let’s start with the data: after all of this time, I’ve compiled 11,900 tweets, with 1,144 followers.

In other words, that’s an average of 9-10 new followers per month, or 2-3 per week. Out of nearly 100 tweets per month, or 3-4 per day.

For every day’s tweets, I would tend to scour event listings, accelerator newsletters, investor research reports, local tech and business newsletters, and more, for about 1 hour — usually in the early mornings or late evenings.

The goal was to identify unique, yet broadly topical bits of info that were interesting to me and, hopefully, my follower audience. In other words, if you translate that into 8-hour workdays, I was spending nearly 2.5 workdays per month searching for the perfect tweets.

And, what did it get me? A handful of nice, ego-stroking mentions, like…

• Being named one of the “Ten Must-Follow Tweeter for Austin Tech” by Austin Inno, and
• Having occasional tweets get featured in the online articles and blog posts of others, like this favorite on the “Pharma Bro”

And, every once in a while, I would hear from someone who followed my Twitter account and knew me, relayed that they had read some bit of news or seen some event or program listing in my Twitterstream, acted upon it, and received some kind of positive outcome for themselves.

In many ways, that was the most satisfactory to hear, because it is very aligned with my personal, pay-it-forward philosophy. But, in the end analysis, it wasn’t enough. Especially with other social media options, like LinkedIN, Facebook, and newer ones.

Sorry @Jack, @Biz, @Ev…thanks for helping to put SXSW Interactive on the map — even though the Southby launch story is more legend than truth — as a must-attend tech festival years ago. But, I’m @done.