The last thing you want to do when connecting with others on Twitter is alienate the community. Twitter is easy to use, but there are a few basic things to keep in mind.

• Don’t spam - This should be obvious, but it’s not always that simple. Twitter is all about communicating. If all your tweets are links to your websites and blog posts, you’re talking without ever listening — and very few people are going to signup to follow (aka listen to) you.

  Self-promotion should be a very small percentage of your overall tweets, and should still be shared in the spirit of being useful to the general Twitter community.

• Follow with care - It’s highly suspicious for someone to be following 1,000 people and only have 10 people following them back. Build your personal community slowly and with care.
• Keep your Following / Followers numbers relatively close - Many people on Twitter will choose not to follow you if they see that you have hundreds of followers but only follow a handful of people. A lot of people are surprised to find that following a couple hundred extra people doesn’t actually change their experience very much, but your mileage may vary. You definitely don’t have to follow back everyone who follows you, but be aware that you ultimately influence the size of your community by the number of people you choose to follow.
• Learn the difference between replies and direct messages - Everyone who follows you on Twitter can see your replies. However, only the recipient can see your direct messages.

  It’s commonplace and perfectly acceptable to reply to someone if your answer could also be of interest to other people. However, if your response would only be of interest to the recipient, that’s better left to a direct message.

  Along these lines … it can be annoying to read or receive replies that just say “Hi!” If you want to contact someone casually, direct message them and ask for their IM name or email address.

• No one reads every tweet - There should be no expectation that any particular person read every single one of your tweets. That’s the beauty of the forum. If you have an important question or announcement, it’s okay to tweet it a couple times over the course of a day, but never whine that no one is responding to you.
• Interact - If you can respond to someone else’s question, do it! Everyone’s contributions are important.
• Ignore the “hierarchy” - Sure, it can be harder to get the attention of someone with 1,000 followers as opposed to someone with 10 followers, but Twitter is meant for open communication between everyone. Don’t be intimidated — reach out and interact with anyone you consider interesting.
• There aren’t actually any rules - We’ve all broken most of these guidelines before. That’s why they’re guidelines and not laws. Besides, there are no Twitter police. If you make a mistake, just keep tweeting and try not to do it again.