General Twitter ettiquete states that you should follow anyone who follows you.  There are metrics such as TFF ratio (Twitter Follower-Friend Ratio) which supposedly indicate your success and popularity in Twitter.

On my On my business twitter account I pick and choose who I follow. I could auto follow my followers but I prefer to take the time to pick and choose  my twitter friends so I don’t clutter my twitter page.

Here is my quick way of determining who to follow:

Fewer Followers. Lots Followed.

If the “following” numbers are rather low (under the hundreds), this indicates that the person is interested in Twitter for information, not necessarily for mini-blogging. I look for quality posts so I like to follow these followers.

If the numbers that the person follows are high (in the thousands) this person/business could be trying to attract followers by following others. Know that Twitter doesn’t like folks to follow too many folks. In fact they do stop you from following others when you’ve hit a high amount such as 2000. I tend to avoid these twitter pages.

Lots of Followers. Few Followed. 

 In general, whether the numbers are low or high - this does seem to indicate that the twitter is worth following.

If there is a small gap between the two numbers it probably indicates that the person is politely following those who follow him but is picking and choosing. I like following those who pick and choose (Like me!)

If the gap between follow”ees” and followers  is large it could mean that the account owner is posting more than  reading.  This might be someone worth following but there isn’t a lot of engagement.

Still don’t know if you should follow or not? Well – it’s up to you. Here is another great article which might help: 7 Indicators of Twitter Influence

Articles of interest:

7 Indicators of Twitter Influence

Relevancy, Engagement, Value – Why You Should or Shouldn’t Follow Me

How to Auto-Follow Those That Follow You on Twitter

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