By bbr

by Kelly Googe Lucas, client marketing director

In a post on their blog yesterday, Twitter announced they are making it easier for users to send and receive a Direct Message (DM) on the popular platform.

Historically, if you wished to send a private DM to another user, it was required that you followed each other. Now, users can simply click a box in their settings that allows them to receive DMs from other users. Of course, this doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll get a response should you DM someone now, but at least you can contact people with whom you aren’t directly connected a bit more privately and not have to broadcast your question or comment across the public Twittersphere.

The updates include:

•   A profile setting that allows you to receive DMs from any user. (Click here for the step-by-step instructions.)
•   Ability to reply to anyone who sends you a DM.
•   Updated profile pages on Android and iPhone that display a button when a user accepts DMs.

But what happens if you change your settings to accept all DMs and you start getting them from someone you don’t wish to hear from? No problem. You can block the Twitter user and delete the conversation so you won’t have to worry with them anymore.

I expect initially there will be a bit of an onslaught of DM sales pitches, but heck, those happen in the open public feeds anyhow. However, having needed to DM someone in the past and had to do a dance of “please follow me” to finally get that ability, I’m actually excited about this change. I think it will make it much easier to quickly and succinctly say or ask what is needed without having to include everyone else on Twitter.

What do you think – will it make messaging easier for you? Do you even plan to adjust your settings? We’d love to hear your thoughts.