- Do You Really Need Twitter Automation Tools?
- What About Twitter against Automation?
- Best Twitter Tool for the Straight Shooter: Agorapulse.com
- Best Twitter Tool for the Risk Taker: Tweepi
- Best Twitter Tool for the Daredevil: TweetAttacksPro
- How I Gained over 100K+ Followers on Twitter
QUICK LINKS
Before diving into the best follow/unfollow tools for Twitter, let’s talk about ‘why Twitter?‘
Why, indeed?…
Is Twitter Still Worth Its Marketing Salt?
Twitter, the former golden child of social media, took a huge nosedive, no question about it.
The good news is it didn’t roll over and give up.
Twitter has been actively working to make the platform “a healthier and valuable everyday service”, as Twitter’s CEO Jack Dorsey put it during Q3 2018 earnings announcement, by:
- getting rid of bots and fake accounts
- fighting content spam
- making GDPR improvements
- and much more
As a result:
- Twitter now has 326 million monthly active users. (Q3 2018, source)
- 46% of American Twitter users visit the site at least once a day. (2018, source)
- 24% of US adults use Twitter – not far off from LinkedIn, Pinterest, Snapchat, and even Instagram. (2018, source)
For more on Twitter demographics, take a look at Top Twitter Demographics That Matter to Social Media Marketers.
- Twitter is now CONSISTENTLY profitable (Q3 2018, source) – good news for Twitter, its users, and those of us who’d like to reach those users.
- Twitter showed a 50% increase in ad engagements (2018, source) – if you have cash to spare, this might be the right place to spend it!
- Twitter is #21 on 2018 Forbes’ Top 100 Digital Companies. (Facebook is #26)
Bottom line is Twitter marketing DOES work.
“Will it still work tomorrow though?…” some might ask.
Hmmm…
What if all your Google search engine traffic disappeared tomorrow? Would you stop optimizing your site for search engines?
Oh, wait… that’s called ‘algorithm updates‘! 🤣
Traffic from Google is the very definition of ‘here today, gone tomorrow‘ kind of traffic; yet here we are, knocking ourselves out to get it!
And what about Facebook and its ‘zero reach‘ for business pages? Did you put a lid on your Facebook marketing, despite the fact you are barely reaching your audience? Exactly.
Successfully marketing your business is about reaching your ideal audience where it is TODAY, right NOW. If you don’t, you bet your competitors will.
That’s exactly why I am such a huge proponent of content repurposing, by the way.
Do You Really Need Twitter Automation Tools?
Twitter automation tools to Twitter marketing are what cookies are to milk.
Sure you can have one without the other, but… why would you?
Together, they simply make sense.
Automating the right Twitter tasks (like following and unfollowing users) in the right (for you) way will result in more
- targeted Twitter followers,
- Twitter traffic to your website,
- 💰 at the end of the rainbow. 😉
…guaranteed.
What Should You Automate on Twitter?
There are two sides to your Twitter presence:
- growing the number of your Twitter followers (targeting/following/unfollowing)
- engaging/interacting with those followers
The latter, engaging and interacting with your Twitter followers, is best left to a human – YOU.
The former, growing the number of your Twitter followers, is what you should be using Twitter automation tools for.
How Exactly Do You Get More Twitter Followers?
BE INTERESTING
There you have it. The key to successful Twitter marketing. Go do it.
🤔 🤨
Still here? Alrighty then…
Some might say that all you need on Twitter is love, and followers will… well, follow.
Pfffffttt…
Sure you can rely on your established name/brand/quality content to wait for Twitter followers to come.
Wouldn’t that be nice?…
In reality, that never happens… unless you have an established name/brand. DO you?…
While being interesting on Twitter (an attention-grabbing bio, profile pic of YOU, useful to your potential Twitter followers content, being present and engaging with Twitter users) is a must, what you and I are interested in today are the mechanics of getting more Twitter followers.
What you need is:
- targeted Twitter followers (QUALITY)
- and more of them (QUANTITY)
Introduce yourself and your quality content to as many potential Twitter followers as you think might be interested in your message, in other words.
The key to successful Twitter marketing is the QUANTITY of QUALITY Twitter followers.Click To TweetThe Mechanics of Getting More Followers on Twitter
Let’s say you’ve just moved into a new neighborhood. [Twitter]
Your next order of business is to knock on neighbors’ [Twitter users] doors to introduce yourself [follow them].
If they are home [active Twitter users], chances are they’ll answer the door to see who’s there [check out your Twitter profile].
If they like what they see [your Twitter content is right up their alley], they will want to stay in touch [follow you back].
If, on the other hand, they aren’t home [inactive Twitter users] or decide you aren’t ‘their people’ [you/your content aren’t of interest to them], they’ll do nothing.
In that case, you might as well scratch them off your friendly neighbors list [unfollow them] and move on.
In other words:
Following and, yes, unfollowing Twitter users is the key to growing your Twitter following.
Plenty of Twitter purists would strongly disagree with that, but hey, they aren’t the ones in need of a smarter Twitter marketing strategy – you and your business are.
This seems to be a good time to address the elephant in the room: Twitter Rules and Policies.
What About Twitter and Its Stand against Automation?
Naturally, you don’t want to have your Twitter account suspended by pushing the automation envelope too far.
While you should read through Twitter Rules and Policies yourself, here are the important things to know as far as Twitter automation goes.
Don’t follow or unfollow Twitter users in a bulk, aggressive, or indiscriminate manner.
Doesn’t say ‘don’t follow/unfollow.‘ Says ‘don’t act like a spammer.’
Twitter monitors users’ accounts for aggressive following and follow churn (repeatedly following and unfollowing large numbers of other accounts).
Of course, they don’t tell you what they consider a LARGE number of other accounts, but they do talk about aggressive following a bit.
Aggressive following is defined as indiscriminately following hundreds of accounts just to garner attention.
However, following a few accounts if their accounts seem interesting is normal and is not considered aggressive.
And another one:
Aggressive follow churn is when an account repeatedly follows and then unfollows a large number of accounts.
This may be done to get lots of people to notice them, to circumvent a Twitter limit, or to change their follower-to-following ratio.
I don’t want to beat around the bush here.
‘Circumventing a Twitter limit’ (see below) and ‘changing your follower-to-following ratio’ (see below) is EXACTLY what you have to do to grow your Twitter account.
So… be reasonable. Don’t follow hundreds of accounts. Daily. Act like a human. 😎
You are allowed to follow 5,000 Twitter accounts total. Then what?
Once you’ve followed 5,000 accounts, it gets tricky. You can’t just continue to follow more Twitter accounts as you please.
From this point on, Twitter will start limiting the number of people you can follow, and that limit (referred to as Twitter limit) is based on your ratio of followers to following.
Why? Twitter doesn’t want you to follow, say, 10,000 people if only 100 people follow you.
Makes sense, right?
The good news is, when you hit your follower limit, Twitter will be good enough to tell you that by displaying an error message in your browser.
The bad news is it doesn’t say much about how that Twitter limit is determined.
(I do have a good idea of how the limit works though; read on.)
Once again, the reason Twitter is imposing such limits on every Twitter user is:
Finally, follower violations are one tactic that spammers often use to abuse Twitter. Monitoring for abuse is one way to reduce spam on Twitter.
Reducing spam on Twitter is something you and I are very much for, aren’t we?
Back to what to do when you hit the 5,000 followers limit…
Rumor has it (the kind of ‘rumor’ that’s been observed to work again, and again, and again) that Twitter will let you follow 10% more users than the number of your followers.
In other words, if you are following 5,000 people, you’ll have to wait until the number of your followers grows over 4,500.
Once that number is 4,600, for instance, 10% of 4,600 is 460. Now add 460 back to your existing number of followers (4,600) and your allowable Twitter following limit is now 5,060.
Does that make sense?
Needless to say, use this formula as a guidance, not a fact! 😉
Why is this important to know? Because you could be waiting forever until the number of your Twitter followers catches up with the number of people you are following!
Thus, unfollowing Twitter users becomes a necessity, NOT an option.
What about third-party applications promising to “get more followers fast”?
What Twitter refers to are websites or applications that
- ask you to pay them to add followers to your Twitter account,
- ask you to follow a list of other accounts in order to participate,
- tell you to join follower trains,
- offer to automatically add followers to your account.
Twitter is absolutely right: DO NOT use those kinds of Twitter tools.
Not only do they violate just about every Twitter rule, but they often add followers with abandoned accounts or bot accounts that are not reading your updates.
Bots don’t make very good customers! 😅
Another type of automation tool Twitter is definitely against is the fully automated kind. Tweet Adder and Social Quant were good examples of those.
Tweet Adder and Social Quant were the tools I and many other Twitter users relied on for years to grow the number of followers on Twitter.
However, according to the current Twitter API rules, automatically getting more Twitter followers (as in ‘software that follows/unfollows any given list of people completely automatically‘) is no longer an option.
That’s why both Tweet Adder and Social Quant, as well as a few similar Twitter tools, were shut down for good.
Now that full automation is the thing of the past, the best Twitter tools are those that allow you to target your potential Twitter audience as specifically as possible, plus follow/unfollow Twitter users in the most efficient manner possible.
In other words, you are still the one who has to literally click follow/unfollow buttons… ‘manual automation’, if you will.
Twitter tools mentioned below are NOT fully automated. They compile user data, you click Follow/Unfollow.
Last, but not least:
You don’t get to pass the buck if caught violating Twitter rules.
Meaning, since YOU are the one choosing to use a third-party application, YOU are the one who stands to bear consequences. NOT the third-party application.
Exercise due diligence. Do your own research. Use your head; that’s what it’s there for!
Links to bookmark:
Back to this:
STEP 1. Use Twitter Automation Tool to Follow the Right Users
Getting more Twitter followers starts by finding your target audience on Twitter.
Ten engaged Twitter followers who want what you have to offer beat hundreds who could care less.
Thus, the first thing you are looking for in the right Twitter tool is the ability to target the right people.
Most Twitter follow tools let you:
- Follow any user’s Twitter followers
For instance, if you want to ‘steal’ your competitor’s Twitter followers, you can enter @CompetitorUsername and let the Twitter tool pull up the list of their followers. All you have to do then is… follow them! - Follow people another Twitter user follows
Take me, for instance (@AnaTrafficCafe on Twitter.) I have close to 10,000 followers, but follow only some 130 people. You might, rightfully so, conclude that I only follow people whom I hope to learn from. With this feature, you are able to follow the people I follow. - Follow members of any Twitter list
Self explanatory: follow members of any Twitter list! - Follow Twitter users by #topic
Compile a list of Twitter user who mentioned a specific #hashtag.
Once you compile your targeted Twitter user list, follow, follow, follow!
STEP 2. Use Twitter Automation Tool to Unfollow the Uninterested
You follow Twitter users to peak their interest, get them to look at your profile, then follow you back.
What happens if they don’t?
They become dead weight. And count against that precious Twitter followers limit… Can’t let them do that!
I usually wait for about a week for people to follow me back.
If not, I assume it’s one of two things:
- they aren’t interested (a.k.a they aren’t my target audience)
- they aren’t active enough on Twitter (a.k.a they aren’t my target audience)
Either way, unfollowing them is the sensible (and necessary!) thing to do.
Most good Twitter unfollow tools let you sort your followers by whether they follow you, their last tweet date, number of followers they have, etc.
STEP 3. Be Present, Be Human – NO Tools Required
If your objective is driving traffic, leads, and sales, then you need to focus on building a meaningful Twitter presence.
Otherwise… your time would be better spent elsewhere.
If Twitter is worth doing, it's worth doing well. Click To TweetHOW do you build a meaningful Twitter presence?
- Be a part of the conversation.
Listen. Think. Weigh in. - Focus on others.
Quote. Promote. Share. - Add self-promotion.
Your own agenda comes LAST. And in moderation.
Helpful: How to Manage Twitter Like a Pro [Your Daily Twitter Routine]
By the way, even though I did say ‘No tools required‘ to be present, tools DO help tremendously to manage your Twitter and other social media accounts a lot more efficiently.
I use Agorapulse for that; you’ll learn more about it below.
FINALLY… onto the best Twitter tools to grow your Twitter presence!
Agorapulse.com
The best Twitter tool to get more followers is… the one you might already be using.
Like a social media management platform that helps you maintain various social media accounts.
Hootsuite. Buffer. Sprout Social. Or Agorapulse, like it is for me.
DISCLOSURE: there are several affiliate links in this post. That means that, should you choose to buy a product following one of those links, I will receive a commission from the product creators. Doesn’t cost you a dime, but helps me to continue offering all content at Traffic Generation Café 100% free.
At first glance, you might struggle to see how a Twitter tool like Agorapulse could help you grow your Twitter followers; especially when it comes to following and unfollowing users.
Allow me to show you.
Agorapulse has a Listening feature that could be used to find your perfect Twitter audience. Using that feature, you can easily find people tweeting about specific subjects or mentioning you.
To see how it works,
- choose your Twitter profile
- click Listening
- click Create a new search
The next screen has the option to Create a new search.
You can search by hashtags, multiple words, phrases, or Twitter handles. Click Next when done.
Now that your search is saved, back to the Dashboard you go.
From there, click Filters, then specify the saved search results you’d like to see.
Click any tweet and you’ll see options like liking, replying, opening it in Twitter, and yes, following that person.
Extremely targeted, easy, and efficient – now you see why I love Agorapulse so much! 👍😀
If you are already using a social media management platform, look for a feature similar to Agorapulse Listening.
If not, I highly recommend you check out what Agorapulse can do for your business.
And, by the way, Agorapulse is 100% Twitter compliant.
A bit of a drawback is that you can’t unfollow Twitter users with Agorapulse.
If unfollowing is something you are planning on doing, you should look into one of the Twitter tools below.
RIP, ManageFlitter.com
Wow… just as I was about to recommend ManageFlitter as my top follow/unfollow Twitter tool, it was (permanently?) shut down by Twitter for violating Twitter automation rules!
And that was the tool that I and star Twitter marketers like Madalyn Sklar believed to be as safe and Twitter-compliant as they come…
We love you, Twitter, but really?…
Since ManageFlitter is no more, we’ll take a look at Tweepi instead.
Tweepi.com
The very first thing you’ll like about Tweepi is how simple the dashboard is.
There are three actions you can take with Tweepi:
- Follow
- Unfollow
- Interact
Tweepi also offers to make your life even simpler (or so it seems) with its personalized Tweepi AI recommendations.
I took a good look at those recommendations and decided ‘No, thank you.’
Are you going to follow Tweepi AI recommendations or decide what’s good (or not!) for your business all on your own?… 😲🤯😜
Tweepi Follow Tool
Tweepi Follow tool allows you to:
- Follow any user’s Twitter followers
- Follow people another Twitter user follows
- Follow members of any Twitter list
- Import (copy/paste, to be more precise) your own list of Twitter users you’d like to follow
- Follow Twitter users by #topic or location
Since the features you get with Tweepi depends on your account status (free or paid), let’s talk about that.
Tweepi offers a free package in addition to two Premium plans.
Tweepi Free vs Premium
Tweepi free package is a good way to take the service for a spin.
Since they don’t make the link to create a free account readily available, here it is. 😉
However, I am going to tell you to get a Premium account with Tweepi.
I am NOT affiliated with Tweepi in any way; that’s not why I am trying to sell you on it.
The reason I tell you to go all in is because I’ve seen one too many Twitter tools disappear into thin air as of late, including the recent demise of ManageFlitter.
That’s why you should absolutely take full advantage of Tweepi or TweetAttacksPro (more on that one below), while they are still around.
There you have it; I said my piece. Think about it. Then act.
Here’s how much Tweepi Premium accounts currently run:
Please keep in mind that a Tweepi account can only be linked to one Twitter account. If you have more than one Twitter account, you’ll need to pay a separate monthly fee for each.
OF NOTE
Tweepi free accounts are limited to following 100 users and unfollowing 100 users per day.
For Premium accounts, following is limited to 950 users per day and unfollowing is limited to 500 users per day.
If you ask me, 950 and 500 per day is waaaaaaay too aggressive. Proceed with extreme caution.
Tweepi Unfollow Tool
From Tweepi Dashboard, click Cleanup Users You Follow. (🤔 wait, shouldn’t ‘cleanup’ actually be ‘clean up’ in this case?…)
You’ll be presented with the list of Twitter users whom you follow, but who don’t follow you back.
You can choose to apply various filters to further narrow down that list.
For instance, you can unfollow Twitter users with:
- inactive accounts,
- no bio descriptions,
- egg avatars,
- and many other criteria.
Once you have your unfollow list in place, simply hover over the name, and you’ll see the blue Unfollow button.
Simple and impressive.
Twitter Follow/Unfollow Tools I’d Stay Away from
There were a couple of Twitter tools I checked out and found that the Follow/Unfollow features were too slim to be worth your time:
- Commun.it
- UnfollowSpy
By the way, if you do test a third-party tool/application that asks you to connect to your account on Twitter (in developer’s terms, that’s called OAuth), that means you give that tool access to your Twitter account.
OAuth is an authentication protocol that allows you to approve a tool/application to act on your behalf without sharing your password.
And what happens if you no longer use the tool? It will continue to have access to your Twitter account, unless you specifically revoke that access.
I strongly suggest you do so.
Twitter has been known to terminate user accounts simply because those users, at one point or another, gave access to an app that was later found to be breaking Twitter automation rules and banned by Twitter – even if they haven’t used the app for years.
To do revoke access to your Twitter account, go to Settings and Privacy…
…then click Revoke access to cut off any unwanted app(s).
How to Choose the Best Twitter Tool
So, how do you pick the Twitter tool that best suits YOUR Twitter marketing needs?
Your risk tolerance is your best guide.
The Best Twitter Tool for the Straight Shooter [White Hat]
If you are a straight shooter and prefer to be safe than sorry, then grow your Twitter followers completely organically with the help of a platform like Agorapulse.
Organic growth is all about hands-on genuine engagement, beneficial to all parties involved – you, people you follow, people you want to be followed by, and their Twitter followers.
Follower by follower, establish yourself as someone worth following, and Twitter users will start flocking to your account all on their own – a thing of beauty, let me tell you! 😉
That’s how my current Twitter account, @AnaTrafficCafe, was built.
The Best Twitter Tool for the Risk Taker [Gray Hat]
You are all for marketing on Twitter, but putting all your eggs into organic Twitter engagement basket?… No, thank you very much; you’ve got a business to run.
Then definitely get Tweepi or, better yet, TweetAttacksPro (more on that one below.)
Dip your toes into a bit of a gray area with some automation without overdoing it.
Where’s the line between being reasonably safe from Twitter’s iron fist and ‘overdoing it’?
Sorry, that’s a question for the Magic 8 Ball… 🎱😅
The Best Twitter Tool for the Daredevil [Black Hat]
You like to get things done – yesterday.
Your objective is to cast as wide of a Twitter net as you can, bring your Twitter followers back to your site, and engage with them on your own turf and terms.
That, to me, makes a lot of sense.
I believe that building an audience on a third-party platform is one of the riskiest things a website owner can do.
Sooner or later, those platforms hang you out to dry.
Examples?
- Google algorithm changes.
- Facebook Zero reach.
- Twitter API changes.
Once you turn your social media followers into your website fans, email list subscribers, customers, then by all means, solidify those relationships on social media all you want.
Back when I was an online nobody, I nailed this process – I created the perfect, if I may say so myself 🤩, ‘from social media to website’ funnel… buuuuuut I am getting ahead of myself.
For now, let’s get back to my top Twitter tool pick for the daredevils among you. (Works great for the risk takers, too!)
Best Twitter Tool for the Daredevil: TweetAttacksPro
TweetAttacksPro is like Tweet Adder… on steroids.
TweetAttacksPro is a piece of downloadable software, compatible with both Windows and Mac.
The list of TweetAttacksPro features is impressive, to say the least.
With TweetAttacksPro, you can:
- Manage unlimited accounts.
- Verify those accounts automatically using an email or phone number.
- Run accounts without Twitter API.*
- Or… you can choose to use Twitter API to run your accounts.
- Target Twitter users by keywords, other users’ followers, list imports, and more.
- AUTO follow 👆 those users.
- AUTO unfollow users defined by various criteria.
- Schedule tweets and delete old tweets.
- @mention users in your tweets.
- Auto retweet by keywords and other criteria.
- Favorite tweets, as well as reply to tweets.
- Send direct messages (DMs).
- Add/edit/manage your frequently used messages, tweets, comments, and more.
- Use dedicated proxies to protect your account from being banned.
- Auto-solve captcha when needed.
- Auto shorten urls. (read more about shortened urls)
- Run tasks 24/7
- …and this list doesn’t even scratch the surface.
* Allows you to bypass Twitter API limits and restrictions. However, doesn’t mean whatsoever you aren’t breaking Twitter rules. 🤨😉
DISCLOSURE: there are several affiliate links in this post. That means that, should you choose to buy a product following one of those links, I will receive a commission from the product creators. Doesn’t cost you a dime, but helps me to continue offering all content at Traffic Generation Café 100% free.
Why do I like TweetAttacksPro that much?
Two reasons:
- TweetAttacksPro allows you to fine-tune your Twitter strategy like no other Twitter tool.
- I love the fact you can run it independent of Twitter API. That means Twitter can’t just cut off TweetAttacksPro, like it did with ManageFlitter.
TweetAttacksPro also works well for all shades of gray – people who are comfortable with Gray Hat Twitter marketing and Blackhatters alike.
Don’t use ANY follow/unfollow automation tool on your primary Twitter account – the one that you’d absolutely hate to lose.
Grow that one as organically as you can. Use Agorapulse to help you, that’s it.
How I Gained over 100K+ Followers on Twitter
Back when I started Traffic Generation Café, I quickly took it from an unknown blog to top 18,000 global sites according to Alexa.com… in 4 months.
What is Alexa website ranking? <= learn here
And Twitter was largely how I got there. It was the first traffic generation strategy I mastered. I…
- read everything I could get my hands on about Twitter marketing,
- experimented with various Twitter automation tools,
- created a compelling reason to bring my new Twitter followers back to Traffic Generation Café,
- then perfected the entire process to the point where it took me 20-30 minutes a day to continue driving loads of Twitter traffic.
Here’s my process, in a nutshell:
- Create several Twitter accounts.
Five, to be precise. Multiple Twitter accounts are completely within Twitter rules, IF they are substantially different and you don’t crosspost between them – meaning, don’t post the same tweets across those accounts. Why create multiple accounts? To multiply the number of Twitter followers you can target at the same time. - Get TweetAttackPro.
I used TweetAdder back then. This was a must – there was no way I could’ve done this by hand. - Search for TARGETED potential Twitter followers.
Don’t skip this step – you can’t sell a burger to a vegetarian! - Start following Twitter users on a daily basis.
While closely watching Twitter limits, of course. I also avoided full automation. - Send new Twitter followers a killer DM message.
I offered my new followers to promote their blogs at Traffic Generation Café; that’s how I quickly transitioned them back to MY online turf. 😉 - Tweet valuable to your followers content.
I use Agorapulse to help me make this seemingly overwhelming task a LOT more manageable. - Be present.
Monitor @mentions, thank people when they share your content, share others’ content MORE than you share your own. Be present, be human.
As a result of this Twitter traffic strategy ‘a la Ana‘, I got thousands of new website visitors every month – without the overwhelm.
Of course, it didn’t go without a glitch. I had a couple of accounts shut down by Twitter.
However, I knew the risks, accepted them, and didn’t cry much about the lost accounts. The website traffic I received as a result far outweighed the downsides of being a gray hatter. No guts, no glory!
Here’s another bonus for you: my exact follow/unfollow pattern I used back then.
Feel free to lower those numbers according to your risk tolerance. I wouldn’t up them though. 😉
The first number is what I called a peaceful takeover, the second one is more of a hostile (aggressive) one.
My Follow / Unfollow Pattern
Week 1 & Week 2
Mon ADD 315-385
Tue ADD 315-385
Wed ADD 315-385
Thurs ADD 315-385
Fri ADD 315-385
Sat Remove those who don’t follow you back
Sun ADD 405-495
Week 3 & Beyond
(you still follow the same number of people)
ADD | ADD in AM
ADD | ADD in AM
ADD | ADD in AM
ADD | REMOVE in PM
ADD | ADD in AM
REMOVE | ADD in AM
ADD | REMOVE in AM
Let your comfort zone be your guide.
Best Twitter Tool Marketing Takeaway
Getting Twitter followers will never be as easy as it once was, true.
However, armed with the best Twitter tool of your choice, plus common sense, I believe you’ll do well.
Twitter can be an incredible traffic generator (it’s always been for Traffic Generation Café).
Now, it’s your turn to figure out how to make it work for YOU.
Have fun storming Twitter! 🏰😜
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