How My Twitter Bot Got 1,000 Followers
Yesterday, @YakovSmirbott (the Yakov Smirnoff joke-telling bot I created last fall) reached 1,000 followers on Twitter. I love “In Soviet Russia…” jokes. They are of course cheesy and terrible, but at the same time, they’re hilarious (especially if you work with a bunch of people who actually grew up in the USSR, like I do!) I should mention that I got the idea from the great @mitchhedbot.
@YakovSmirbott tweets a joke at people who mention “Yakov Smirnoff” or “In Soviet Russia.” It also tweets a joke to its followers about once a day. So far, it’s over 20,000 tweets. I’ve learned a few things from the response.
First of all, if you Twitter-spam the hell out of people, one in twenty will follow you. Secondly, it’s easy to get in endless twitter bot reply loops if you’re not careful.
Most of the non-bot replies have fallen into one of three categories:
- "Ha ha, good one!"
- "I don’t get it, who are you?"
- "SHUT UP!"
Most of the response has been in the first category though, with this tweet being my absolute favorite:
The fact that @YakovSmirbott exists is fantastic
Thanks @bizmark!
