Tweeting is in...for a lot of reasons. Relationships, news, networking, branding, fun, and yes, the little blue bird is even used for traffic generation. Besides links embedded in tweets and the "Website" portion of the bio in the upper right hand corner of every Twitter profile page, direct messages (DMs) are used for generating traffic.

I write this article in the middle of the continuing debate...should we or should we not use services that send automated DMs to people who choose to follow us? Many say NO, no matter what.

So why are you telling me how to send Twitter Auto DMs?

I believe there are ways to appropriately auto DM those who choose to follow you. Here are a few reasons:

1) If they are following you for the right reasons (to learn more about you and enjoy your tweets) why would they be against a little bit more information about/from you?

2) If they are following you for other reasons (to get you to follow back) they should have no complaints about a little message from you..

3) All DMs are not evil. If they were, Twitter would not have included the feature. But if you message people with only selfish interests, can you expect anything other than complaints?

In fact, in the auto DM service I use, they specifically state when you create your auto DM text that it should not be about you, but rather about the person you are messaging. So, as you continue forth on your path of tweeting and being to send auto DMs, please keep in mind that they should be useful to the recipient, not just to you.

How to Use Tweet Later to Send Auto DMs in Twitter

We are going to use TweetLater to send Auto DMs. There is a very short process:

1) First, create a free TweetLater account by clicking on the "Register Now" button. Fill out the short form, and you are done.

2) Next, log in to your account and in the right hand column under "My Account" click on "Account".

3) In the blue tabs that you see running across the middle-top of your screen, click on the "Add Account" tab.

4) Fill out the form to setup the account, if you want an auto DM check the "Send a Welcome Message" box and type in a message under 120 characters in the box below.

5) Click save at the bottom.

There you go, every time someone follows you now they will automatically be sent a welcome DM with the message of your choice. Use this at your own risk if you choose to be selfish with your DMs. People like value, give them something they can actually use and they will thank you for it.