So, I have had a fairly infuriating time with Twitter lately due to millions of spam messages, having to weed out the tweets I want to read from the thousands of others I dont and generally feeling slightly harrassed whenever I logon.
This lead me on a quest to find a fix and I have finally found a solution which allows you to cut out the noise, select groups of friends so you only have to listen to what they are saying (or “tweeting”) and you can even do this on your iPhone as well as your desktop! (and its free)
Some of you may already know this, but for those that dont I wanted to share the info to help make your time on Twitter more productive and enjoyable!
I recorded the below video in a rush for you all this morning so I could share it with you all quickly! Leave a comment if you find it useful. 
I’m not at all a heavy user of Twitter, but I can completely see the benefit of using a client, and TweetDeck is one of the best. There are a huge number of alternatives though!
I myself use a little Windows 7 gadget (They work on Windows Vista too!) which you can nab from http://www.buildagadget.com/Downloads.php?Sort=Vista (Twitter Explorer, a little way down the list). It has very few features but it’s nice to stop the temptation of running to Twitter.com every few minutes!
.-= Marc Fowler´s last blog ..Introducing: MooButtons =-.
Nice tip Marc, and something which stops you going to the Twitter website every five seconds is also a benefit in terms of not losing focus or productivity so I might use this too as a way to quickly keep up to date when no other programs are running.
The major benefit I wanted to outline with TweetDeck however, is that you can create groups of friends and ignore the mass rubbish tweets and just focus on the ones your friends are posting. This is pretty major.
Also, for me the reason TweetDeck is the one I did a quick video about (Rather than all the other masses of Twitter clients) was because it has a free iphone app which does the same thing and syncs together with the desktop app.
Obviously not everyone uses an iPhone but ive spoken to LOADS of people recently who do and who wished to cut the noise out from Twitter. TweetDeck desktop together with the free iPhone app gives them a way to do this on both devices for free.
Good tip though! Ill check it out. Look forward to seeing you around the blog more.
Thanks for the comment
Hi Josh
Time to visit my neighbor classmate’s blog! I live here in Melbourne, Australia and has been there in NZ for a vacation. Great place and views!
Your blog speaks volumes of your successes in IM and am sure with Alex coaching it will be at a higher speed.
Regards
Nona
.-= Nona Sangalang´s last blog ..What Is Blogging? =-.
Hey josh my man
great post mate I will have to implement this my friend.
hey where you been? been wanting to talk to you for ages mate.
speak soon I hope
cheers
marcus passey
Hey Josh!
Great video. You know my story with Twitter. I had a bunch of crap a recently cleared it in favor of following just a few people. Tweetdeck will really be great for once I really start to ramp up my following again. Some great advice here!
Matt
Hey Josh!
This is exactly how I do things with TweetDeck. Unfortunately there are a lot of spammers on Twitter, and there's arguments for and against having these people follow you – and following them or not.
Ultimately for me it comes down to social proof vs manageability.
WIth regards to social proof – I know for a lot of us high Twitter counts doesn't actually mean a lot because we know that there are a lot of spammers on Twitter – however to others, they literally base their initial opinions on those same counts.
So using TweetDeck in this way keeps things manageable – and retains the "perceived" social proof that some people will get from your Twitter counts.
Great post as always!
Speak soon!
Iain
Hey Iain, thanks for the comment on the post and for taking the time to stop by.
I agree, there is SO much spam on Twitter, this was completely stopping me from enjoying it, I only have around 1,300 followers which is kind of deliberate up until now. I wanted a small but focused and responsive following and that seems to have worked well. I get around 50 clicks when I sent a link out and alot of RT's etc. (I think I had over 120 unique clicks on one link in one tweet before so I was pretty happy with that!)
Now I have found this technique to "filter" through the noise on Twitter I will be growing my following because I can still focus on the people I want to focus on as my follower amount grows so its a great tool because of that.
I agree with the social proof point you bring up, that is very true. I still believe quality is more important that quantity but both is even better! (And the social proof point is certainly a valid one)
SPeak soon Iain!
Hi Josh!
Yes, I definitely agree that quality over quantity is the most important aspect – and in the past I got a music brand that had 46k subscribers on their list and when I started working with them I walked in and culled almost 3/4 of their list on them – because they were unresponsive and in most cases weren't interested in being on their list.
However, Twitter's a curious entity in this respect because so many people really do pay heed to the follower count.
As you say – without being able to filter the noise with TweetDeck (or something similar) it's a nightmare – but being able to filter out the noise *AND* get that social proof has to be a winner.
I think Twitter Grader sum this up perfectly – if you haven't already read the post at http://grader.com/blog/ I really recommend it. It gives a great insight on how they give Twitter gradings/rankings – and also puts a different spin on the current backlash against high Twitter counts.
Anyways, I'm writing an essay again… LOL… Really want to catch up with you soon on Skype bro if that's cool?
Speak soon!
Iain.
Josh,
I need to get Tweetdeck myself. I have been saying this for months and months – even BEFORE I went to Las Vegas in May!. Truth is I have been outrageously busy. There always seems to be something FAR more important.
I should procrastinate now and just do it.
Gary Simpson
TEMPLE
Gary, thanks for the comment, it took me AGES to finally get around to using it. I heard about it a LONG time ago and just like oyu procrastinated for ages and just stuck with the Twitter website because it was what I knew..
Finding out you could setup groups however tipped me over the edge as the noise was just getting too much!
Hi Josh,
Using some third party software for Twitter is definitely the way to go. I use Seesmic Desktop because I have too many followers for tweetdeck to handle if I wanted to set up another group.
Being able to filter only the people you are really interested in and making it simple to post shortened urls makes using this type of software a must if you are going to seriously use Twitter to interact with your followers.
Good job on getting such a response from your followers though. I must have way too many deadbeats on my account though I have found recently I am getting more retweets etc. I am always open to interacting with people who want to interact with me and that won't change no matter how huge my following grows to.
David
Hey Josh,
Awesome video! I have the desktop version (although I haven't got to grips with it yet!), and am downloading the version for my iPhone as we speak
I didn't realise this was available!
I will get them set up and start using them over the next couple of days!!…Thanks
Talk real soon,
Paul
Hey Paul, good to hear from you!
Yeah, thats what swung it for me finally was the free iPhone app. I pretty much use my iPhone for everything these days so that was a must!
Hey buddy,
I just typed up a long comment and my browser shut down, so let me see if I could do this again…
This video was extremely helpful for me because I have been feeling very overwhelmed with the amount of tweets I've been getting from people from all over. Because of this I've almost ignored Twitter because of the that I didn't know how to organize the messages into any coherent method.
Just like you, I downloaded TweetDeck about four months ago, but I ended up putting it on the back burner. I didn't know I could create the groups and filters like you set up here. Because of this I'm going to dust off TweetDeck and start adding from good friends into my group (don't worry, you'll be included =P)
Get ready to hear more from me on Twitter!
Thanks again, bro.
Joe
Hi Josh,
As one of Alex’s students I have learnt about the power of Social Media but I must admit that I haven’t signed up for Twitter yet because of the stories I hear about spam and thought that I would end up spending too much time on unproductive maintenance tasks keeping this under control.
But thanks to your video on Tweet Deck I can now see that there are ways to control this.
I am now more encouraged to join Twitter with less fear of it turning into a nightmare.
Cheers,
Andrew Graham (an Aussie…..but don’t hold that against me)
.-= Andrew Graham´s last blog ..How to Opt-Out of Google =-.
I (like a few of the other commentators) am not a huge user of Twitter. I have a fair number of followers, and follow a fair number of people, but find that it is not worth the time that I see many people put into it. I do agree though that Tweet Deck is great for Twitter users (from what I’ve heard).
.-= The Gooroo @ iBlogPlanet.com´s last blog ..Be More Than An Entrepreneur – Be A Creative One =-.
Hey Josh,
Tweetdeck looks like just the thing I’ve been looking for.
Thanks for this video, showing the functionality.
I’ll be able to get hold of the software and hit the ground running, now that I’ve watched the vid.
Cheers buddy,
Andrew.
.-= Andrew Vaughan´s last blog ..Is Your Strategy Online, Right for Online Marketing Success? =-.