Twitter now allows you to Direct Message someone when you are not in a mutual place of following each other.
This is fabulous news and I was over-the-top excited when I heard it.
Prior to this, you could not send a Direct Message to anyone on Twitter unless they were following you.
Why so exciting?
It allows you to be able to send someone a message meant for their eyes only which can be very, very helpful when providing customer service support via Twitter or, as in my case, you just want to speak to someone on Twitter and don’t want the world to see it.
I have often talked about my goal of helping one person a week on Twitter. And I do this… very quietly. Generally, my ‘help’ is in the way of advice that I don’t always want the world to see. Often, the business owner has left no way for people to contact them online (surprisingly phone numbers and contact emails are not always on websites) so Twitter can sometimes be the only way left and I end up posting a very public note in order to help out. I would much rather send something more private, which is why this change excites me.
It opens up a window for people to send a DM much easier and ways to converse with people on Twitter has just expanded.
Yes, there is the issue of more spam potentially, but I think we are all clear on what Twitter spam looks like, so just keep hitting that “Report Spam” button and we will rid the Twitterverse of these folks.
For larger companies providing Customer Service, it probably means you will not see those public messages as much anymore…you know the ones like:
“@UserComplainingOnline Please DM us your email and acct number so we can look into it and help”
Inevitably, some people reply back and posted private information they should not be posting online. The company will now be able to direct message the client right away and look after the issue more offline than before.
Test it out! Try sending me a DM (my username is @timeontaskva) and if I am not following you, let me know so I can follow you back!
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