

Want to tweet while you sleep? - joelg87
http://blog.bufferapp.com/post/2715773301/want-to-tweet-while-you-sleep

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fredoliveira
Interesting, but then, I don't really have the ability to follow conversations
while I sleep, which means that one of the key selling points (of generating
conversation) for the app kinda falls short for me.

I don't think a lot of people will care about your tweets if you spurt random
details at scheduled times during the day. Twitter has become part
broadcasting, part conversation (they're still trying to deal with that), but
broadcasting without a sense of chronological context is weird - and possibly
useless?

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joelg87
Hi, I'm the founder so this will be a little biased :)

I definitely agree that you can't respond immediately whilst you are sleeping,
but it can still be effective if you are having a slightly more asynchronous
conversation with people.

I have seen some people use Buffer in ways I did not expect. I originally
thought it would mainly be used for broadcast, but one of the early paying
users is actually using it a lot to ask questions about his particular niche
(happens to be Gin).

Another thing I've started to realise is that it is much easier to react than
it is to act. If you are sharing content fairly regularly using something like
Buffer then it provides many opportunities to react with people who respond to
the content shared.

I think, as with any tool, it can be used in an ineffective way. I would
definitely not recommend people use Buffer and nothing else.

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fredoliveira
I get your points - they're valid. I'm a particular case on twitter because I
have a very short username (@f) and actually miss many of my mentions when
they happen at night (my account gets a huge amount of false positive
mentions, some because of a regexp bug I reported to twitter years ago and
that still hasn't been fixed). For people with very specific usernames
(99.999% of users) that isn't an issue.

Mind you, with my comment I didn't meant to diss the service - It just doesn't
fit my particular use. I'm glad it fits other people fine. Good luck with the
product!

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pamelafox
I personally try not to tweet in the half hour before I go to sleep, as I find
otherwise that I get too anxious wondering what the response will be to my
tweet. I once tweeted something that was seen as offensive on a corporate
Twitter account, and ever since then, I've not felt entirely comfortable
tweeting something and knowing for sure that it won't be taken the wrong way.
At least if I am awake, I can take appropriate action (clarification or
apologizing) if necessary.

It is true that I miss out on some of the interaction by doing much of my
tweeting during the Australia-is-awake time of day. Most of the time, I'm okay
with that. If I'm very keen on an international audience, I will tweet it
twice or tweet it early morning here (afternoon in the US). But I make sure to
always be awake when I do that. :)

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nervechannel
People pay for something you can do with 'at' and 'curl'? I wish I was an
entrepreneur.

~~~
maukdaddy
Yes, because the average user knows what either of those are. Let alone the
millions of businesses who might use this service.

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armandososa
I like this a lot. I've used cotweet and hootsuite exclusively for the tweets
scheduling feature (everything else is bloat to me) and always thought that
somebody should turn this feature into a minimalist product.

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famfamfam
I agree, I (with rather bad timing) I spent part of yesterday scheduling over
a month's worth of tweets into CoTweet, the ability to not have to manually
enter a date and time repeatedly would have saved a large amount of time.

However, after watching the video I wished. I don't want to enter my
information without at first being able to see what the limitations would be
on the free plan. The text on the site doesn't say anything about non-free
plans/pricing other than that they exist. Careful scrubbing along the video
does suggest its 2 a day (which would be fine for a free plan), with a max of
5 in the buffer which is so low as to completely ruin any plans of swapping it
in for CoTweet and makes me much less willing to enter my email address.

May I suggest placing the plans/pricing information on the site? There is a
page for it, but it appears to be mostly a duplicate of the homepage without
any extra information.

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joelg87
Hi Mark, a fellow brummie, I think we might even have met - I did a bit of
work for Andy Higgs not too long ago.

Firstly, my apologies for the lack of pricing information. There was pricing
information until about 20 minutes ago, at which point having watched in real-
time the bounces off the pricing page I wanted to try something drastic - just
a big button. It was all I could do in the short time I had whilst I had some
traffic I could see the effect with, but it certainly improved the signup
rate. Whether I am now attracting people who will never pay is another matter.

Just so you know, the pricing was:

Free = 2 tweets per day, 5 in your Buffer Standard $5/m = 10 tweets per day,
50 in your Buffer Max $20/m = unlimited

Here is a screenshot - <http://joelg.cc/3zUN>

After some initial feedback, I am considering perhaps increasing the limits on
the free plan so that people can get a real feel for the service. The paid
versions also allow you to use your own Bit.ly details to track the clicks on
your links.

My apologies again, but it was an experiment I had to try. I'd love to chat to
you about how Buffer could be useful for you and answer any questions you
have. Feel free to drop me an email at joel@bufferapp.com

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mxavier
Click on the Plans and Pricing page. No mention of Plans nor Pricing other
than saying I can try it for free (unless it's in the 2:50 long video that I
don't want to watch). I see this happen a lot on these service-based sites and
it never ceases to irk me.

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joelg87
I was doing a small experiment yesterday whilst I had traffic.

The page is now back to it's original design with the pricing take.

Sorry for the confusion :)

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kmfrk
Your feedback box blocks two of the signup buttons. That's pretty bad. :)

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cafard
Spontaneity. Buy it by the bag!

