Today I interviewed Bobby Ullery, Founder of TweepMe.com TweepMe is an application for Twitter users who sign up to follow others who have signed up to follow people. This was recorded as a video, but the file was to big to embed. Thus, we’ve captured theaudio for you. In this interview you will get the following questions answered… and a whole lot more!
Who is Bobby?
What is TweepMe?
What does TweepMe Cost?
What am I limited to for my money?
How exactly does TweepMe work?
What’s up with using my Twitter Password?
Do you infect me with a Tojan or virus?
What can I expect using TweepMe?
Why should I use TweepMe?
Is TweepMe “Spammy?”
Is TweepMe legal?
Why did TweepMe get their account suspended?
I got questions, complaints, and suggestions for TweepMe – Do they care?
What is an API, how does it relate to Twitter, & why should I care?
What was the inspiration for the creation of TweepMe?
What’s in store for the future with TweepMe?
Once most of Twitterville understood TweetMe is a legitimate application program for Twitter users, the debate became heated concerning the altruistic nature of the Twitter community and the use of Twitter.
Twitter now has over eight million users. No one, other than Twitter, is going to tell the users how to use their account, nor how to tweet. It’s clear that some of the naysayers who switched from bashing the program itself, to bashing the idea of following people, are simply panicked! Why?
There are other programs that help accounts grow. There are expensive programs that people have paid big money to use. One of them, Hummingbird, can get accounts suspended. Ask Bobby! Perhaps some of these naysayers are threatened because they do not want the masses to have access to what they alone could previously accomplish.
Ask yourself this question:
Do you want to connect with people you’ve never connected with before who are also looking to connect? If the answer is yes, may I recommend TweepMe. There’s NO rejection!
Sweet! Now listen this great kid teach us all a lesson in graciousness – Enjoy!
Bobby agreed to do a shorter video for us tomorrow to be posted here as an update! Put all questions you have for him in the comments below!
Arleen Anderson
Feel Free to Tweet Me!
A new Twitter application, TweepMe, launched quietly late Tuesday evening. By yesterday morning many in Twitterville had their feathers ruffled and were squawking loudly to their fellow tweeps to not TweepMe. This fury of flying fluff was set off by the issuant retweeting of @Mashable. I saw @BertDecker flow by my tweet stream:
“BertDecker: RT @mashable TweepMe seems to totally misunderstand the point of Twitter. Not recommended. http://www.tweepme.com/“
(Warning! If you’re not using Twitter, you probably don’t want to read this blog post!)
I have great respect for both @Mashable and @BertDecker, but I don’t blurt retweets unless I appreciate or agree with the post. After reviewing their conversations and taking a healthy tour of the TweepMe site, I felt further investigation and thought was in order. As I do exchange tweets with @BertDecker, I sent him this reply:
“AlohaArleen: @BertDecker I check things out B 4 I bash them. Testing http://www.tweepme.com & getting feedback from users. Will let U know”
After carefully reviewing the entire TweepMe site and checking out who the program developer is, I signed up for the service. Please note this was not a light decision on my part! If you know me, you know I do not use any programs to follow, unfollow, or tweet on Twitter! I have run my Twitter account 100% manual from the web.
Signing up for TweepMe was the only way I could test the service and give it an honest review.
I began to reply to Twitter users regarding their questions and concerns they had directed at me regarding TweepMe.
- TweepMe enables people who sign up for the TweepMe service to automatically follow others with their Twitter account who have also signed up for the TweepMe service.
- The user may define his/her own limit of how many other users they will follow per hour (up to 50 – though the developer is now limiting users to a maximum of 30 follows per hour during the beta period)
- This is a mutual follow program. Only those sign up for the service will be followed by others who sign up for the service.
- Following others is completed in rounds. For example; if you had a limit of 30 follows per hour, your account would follow no more than 5 new users every 10 minutes. It could be less.
- Because follows are done in rounds, it may take hours, days, or weeks, to be followed automatically by those who you follow.
- Everyone using TweepMe will get more out of the program if they routinely check their new followers and follow them back immediately.
- As always with Twitter, anyone can always unfollow you. And you can unfollow anyone you chose to unfollow.
The first 1,000 followers receive the TweepMe service for free – for life! From user 1,001 on TweepMe would cost a monthly fee of less than ten dollars. I went back to the site to check the dollar amount, yet it seems to have been taken down. (I believe it said $8.95 a month originally.) I did get one of the first 1,000 free accounts, but they were quickly gone.
I sent TweepMe an email suggesting they extend the free offer to the first 5,000 accounts.
Then I checked my email. I’d had a response from using the “Feedback” section of TweepMe:
“Looks like Twitter may have shut us down. – TweepMe”
My next thought was, “That was the shortest lived application on Twitter yet!”
The Twitter account @TweepMe was suspended. Questions regarding TweepMe continued to pour in. Clearly people wanted this service! But, under the circumstances, I could only reply that they were being shut down and there was no point to signing up.
A couple hours later, I got another email and a tweet from them… TweepMe was up and working, PLUS the free offer was extended to the first 5,000 users! You bet I tweeted that up for people to take advantage of!
Also good to note: All those who paid for TweepMe subscriptions after the initial 1,000 free offers were taken are having their money reimbursed. This was a decision made immediately upon increasing the number of free subscriptions to 5,000.
And the controversy again pursued. Through the wee hours of the morning I shared my humbled perspective on following. Here’s the bottom line for me:
- I can learn something from everyone, thus it is my honor to follow everyone.
- Reading my “Home” page on Twitter (following 57K) is like taking the pulse of the world.
It’s a beautiful view!
It was a little after 2:00 am here in Hawaii, when I called TweepMe programmer and designer, Bobby Ullery.
The TweepMe Programmer:
Bobby, 24 years old, has been coding half his life. He’s a bit shy so we’ll keep this biography part simple. Bobby owns his own company with prominent clients (I’d already checked out that part). Bobby just wants to fill a need with the TweepMe application – Help Twitter users who want, and perhaps need, additional followers add them, and make it easy to do.
Why charge for TweepMe?
The cost of servers, general overhead, and labor for such an application can be extensive. (I think programmers should make money when they provide valuable service!) Bobby’s not looking to get rich off of TweepMe, just make sure the bills are paid.
Suspended!
I asked, “Bobby, your Twitter account @TweepMe got suspended. Do you know why?”
“We were using a hummingbird program to find accounts that would automatically follow accounts back that followed them. This way we would have accounts for our initial users to start adding followers right away. We shouldn’t have done that, and we aren’t going to do it again,” said Bobby. “We are working with Twitter now to get the @TweepMe account reinstated.”
What can TweepMe users expect now from using the service?
Bobby said, “Although users can limit the number of Twitter accounts they follow per hour, up to 50 maximum, we’ll be setting the number lower initially. If a user sets their limit at 30 follows per hour, they’ll see less. We want to make sure that people don’t max out the number of calls per hour their account makes to Twitter’s API if they are using another application such as TweetDeck.”
The Twitter API has a limit of 100 calls (requests) per account per hour.
Why does TweepMe require the use of a user’s password?
“The TweepMe program is following other users. It’s a function done from inside an account. That requires a password, and it is also a call to the Twitter API from the users account,” said Bobby.
I shared with Bobby that people who don’t want to do automatic follows with their Twitter accounts are concerned about the impact TweepMe will have on them. Bobby assured me that they are no longer looking for accounts with automatic follow backs enabled. TweepMe will only have user accounts follow others who have signed up for the service.
What plans does Bobby have for TweepMe in the future?
“We are looking at several different ways to give users more flexibility and control in regards to whom they follow, but that may require a separate application. We are also looking into how to provide additional data on the TweepMe activity to the users. Currently, there is no way to tell if someone followed you because TweepMe followed you on behalf of another user, or for some other reason.”
I asked Bobby, “Anything you want to add?”
“Our purpose with TweetMe is to provide Twitter users who want more followers a simple and consistent way to add those who want to be followed, and will want to follow them back,” said Bobby.
He went on to request, “I hope all our users take advantage of the Feedback Tab on the side of the site pages! We want to hear everyone’s suggestions, complaints, moans and groans. It’s all important for us to make TweepMe everything people want it to be.”
Are you one of those worried about receiving unwanted followers?
Be glad TweepMe has arrived in Twitterville! It only makes sense that the more successful TweepMe is; the less you will have to worry about accounts following you simply for the sake of wanting you to follow them back!
People come to Twitterville for different reasons. TweepMe is a tool which can help keep it a harmonious community. It’s your decision to use it, or not.
What are your thoughts? Any and all comments are welcome!
(Note: Any comments with vulgarities will be pulled)
Aloha!
Arleen Anderson
TweetChat Gets You Focused [35:39m]:
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Tonight on Twitter a new application was introduced by Brooks Bennett. He created TweetChat.com as a tool for tweeps (people on Twitter) which enables you to focus on one conversation, or thread, as it’s being discussed online.
Why is that important? Because if you use Twitter, then you know there can be hundreds or even thousands of different subjects of conversations floating by your page. Being part of a large social media community is great for meeting people, being connected, and getting information on the fly. Yet, if there is one subject you want to follow in particular, it’s easy to miss parts of the conversation.
TweetChat makes it simple to watch, follow, and participate in a conversation. Listen to the creator of TweetChat.com and find out easy it is to focus.
Brooks uses his genius for all kinds of fun. There are a couple additional sites he mentions at the end of the podcast…
Arleen Anderson Interview Katja Presnal [21:16m]:
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As Twitter was all a flutter with moms mad at Motrin on Saturday evening, one smart tweep @KatjaPresnal documented the public relations tornado in living color. Catching up with Katja in the aftermath, she shares her experiences of being dead center in the eye of the “Moms Mad at Motrin” storm.
Katja Presnal, soial media consultant and founder of Skimbaco, captured the conversation of moms who voiced their displeasure with Motrin’s video on the corporate website. The conversation turned nasty with calls of boycott. What started as a simple opinion became a viral explosion as the word spread throughout the Twitter community.
Katja took screen shots of the comments, put them together in a video, and posted it to YouTube early Sunday morning. Tens of thousands watched the video. Many commented on the video and stated they would not be buying Motrin in the future. Motrin woke to one heck of a headache.
Giving Motrin.com credit, they did finally get the video off the website Sunday evening. Open apologies were issued.
The question is: Do the makers of Motrin understand the significance of social media and the impact online communities have on their product and company? Will the corporate world now understand that social media IS mainstream media?
Online news is instantaneous. Bloggers, podcasters, and social media sites spread information faster, and with more influence, than traditional media outlets.
Every business now needs someone in charge of their company’s social media interaction. Yes, business must interact with online social media. Yes, they must listen to what is said in the public online conversations. Yes, they must engage, monitor, and respond to any conversation online pertaining to their products, their company, and their industry.
For small businesses this means another hat someone must wear. It’s an important hat. Engaging with social media is not only a preventative measure for business. It’s a resource when used properly that can provide great reward.
The documentary video of Motrin Moms can be found on Katja’s blog. She can also be reached through Twitter.
The makers of Motrin might want to rethink their market research. Early
this evening numerous moms were talking to one another on Twitter. The
conversation became heated.
Twitter.com is a Social Media site online where people hold conversations
using 140 characters or less at a time. Those on Twitter follow others on
the site and watch their “tweets” of 140 characters go by. What makes
Twitter a powerful means of communication is the speed in which
information is spread throughout the online community.
Tonight a group of moms were “tweeting” that they believe the Motrin
commercial on www.Motrin.com is offensive. The word spread quickly. As
this article is written, there is at least one of these moms making a
video expressing the great displeasure of an entire online community of
moms with Motrin’s commercial. “We need Motrin to know we are smart & will
take action when co’s underestimate & offense moms” as tweeted by
@KatjaPresnal.
Katja Presnal, Public Relations and Social Media Consultant out of New
York is creating a video utilizing the many “tweets” she gathered tonight
from Twitter.com regarding the response to the Motrin commercial. The word
was put out on Twitter that moms are mad at Motrin, and then quickly
tagged. Tagging an item on the internet allows for the tracking of the
popularity of the subject. Upon the writing of this article the tag
#MotrinMoms is second in popularity only to SNL. This means that only
discussion about the television show Saturday Night Live rank higher on
the Twitter site than discussions about the offensive nature of Motrin’s
commercial.
Twitter.com currently has over 325,000 members. It’s free to join and is
fast becoming a tool for business, organizations, and social groups to
communicate rapidly and easily. Motrin’s executive may wake to what
appears to be a Public Relations nightmare. Off line media sources are
also on Twitter, and are likely to pick up this story and run with it in
print, radio, and television by morning.
Moms, dads, and other Tweeters are mad at Motrin for what they believe is
a degrading commercial video at www.Motrin.com Twitter.com has given them
a voice and a means of instant communication to confer and organize.
@AMassofHumanity tweeted, “Holy cow! Just watched the ad. ‘Supposedly it’s
a real bonding experience’ Unbelievably insulting and clueless
#motrinmoms.”
There are “tweets” of boycotting the product. Also important to note, many
members of the Twitter community have their Twitter account integrated
into other Social Media sites such as Facebook and individual blogs. This
means that everything they “tweet” on Twitter is also instantly posted on
their other integrated sites. Thus, the “tweets” by the moms mad at Motrin
are reaching far beyond Twitter tonight.
Within the hour, Ms. Presnal is likely to have her YouTube Video posted
expressing the views of the many “tweets” tonight. A simple search for
Motrin Moms on www.YouTube.com early this morning should pull up the video
currently in creation.
Perhaps this “tweet” sums it up best by @crunchygoddess: “Stop
disrespecting us moms, Motrin. Unlike our babies, we weren’t born
yesterday and we will take our $ elsewhere”
By morning corporate America will learn a lesson. The people still have a
voice. Social Media and the online membership communities have put the
power back in the hands of the people. Tonight moms, and others, express
their displeasure to a merchandiser how out of touch they are with their
target market.
