Twitter Spam is So Hot Right Now – Ugh.

We recently posted about Facebook Spam and how it affects both users and marketers, [note: since that post I've been friended by about 6 fake profiles...].  The other obvious fakery invading our digital lives is all too apparent.  From direct links to multi-lingual pornographic content, to the full gambit of phishing attacks, and even law enforcements’ practice of monitoring the social web — Twitter spam is taking off.

You’ve probably been followed by someone like this at some point…

Or, maybe it’s someone that actually looks real and totally innocent:

You’ll notice the one thing both have in common, they each only have 1 follower.  New services are popping up left and right that claim to automatically build a massive following on Twitter, driving traffic to your business (and making you an overnight success, because traffic = money!).  It will look something like this:

The philosophical hook for Twitter spam relies on the same reciprocation bias that Twitter itself also uses… “if you follow me then I’ll follow you.”  The interesting segment of this ecosystem are the subsequent products that now see a clear opportunity, e.g. http://thetwitcleaner.com/ — which explains, “In the same way that Google proved the cost effectiveness of super targeted advertising, a Twitter list that is 30-50% smaller but full of actual clients & people that are genuinely interested in what you do is worth significantly more than a larger list full of junk.”

As Facebook is under fire for privacy issues and spam continues to proliferate the social web, the important thing is that we the users are at least savvy enough to know what’s real and what’s not — so we can move on.