One of the defining characteristics of Twitter, the seminal short-form social media platform, was that only mutual followers could read each other’s tweets. That is, accounts were protected from receiving spam tweets by requiring all users to accept each other before they could receive messages from certain people.
However, a change to that policy is leaving many online marketers thrilled. According to Sprout Social, verified accounts can now be followed by anyone without requiring the account’s approval. This means that celebrities, brands and private companies that have official, or “verified” accounts no longer need to approve the followers who ask to read their tweets.
This is a boon for internet marketers because it means that instead of requiring businesses to approve each person who applies to follow their Twitter accounts, people can simply sign up to receive the social media messages that a company sends out. This will hopefully create a great deal less work for small businesses that use online marketing to supplement promotional pens, personalized mugs or other types of traditional advertising techniques.