Comments on: Twitter Contests: I Now View Them All as Spam

By: ahockley

ahockley — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 02:04:10 +0000

That's a great observation… if folks choose to tweet or retweet about a contest on their own, I view that as a brand having a great following. Where it crosses the line and seems spam-like to me is when the tweeting is a condition of entry.

I think that Lyza indicated a very similar viewpoint on this week's podcast.

By: Kathleen McDade

Kathleen McDade — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 00:51:10 +0000

So I'm seeing something interesting today: @clevercycles had a contest; the prize was a very nice bike. They did suggest people RT their announcement the day before, but you didn't have to retweet to win (you had to guess a number). And yet many people, self included, retweeted the contest announcements — presumably because we love @clevercycles and think they have a great business. It was content we thought was worth passing on.

By: katemckenna

katemckenna — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 04:41:26 +0000

I completely, 100% agree. I recently retweeted a contest and felt absolutely dirty after. I regretted it the moment I retweeted ;(

By: brianenigma

brianenigma — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 01:03:33 +0000

Repost this blog comment on all of your friends' blogs for a chance to win a free tin of potted meat!

There are times that I really want filters on Twitter. It seems that every few weeks a new spammy contest or spammy game makes the rounds. Of course, filters only patch the symptom, not the fundamental problem. With the “new retweet” syntax and style, at least in theory, people will only see the spam once, but few people use the new style yet and once is still too much. The real fix, as you point out, is for everyone to not be spammy in the first place.