It’s a question that I find myself asking nearly every day. “You just favorited my tweet, why won’t you just retweet me as well!?”

First let me explain briefly what the two can be perceived as, and then let you know my gripe.

Twitter’s Favorite is probably the most confusing function on the network. There are so many ways to interpret it, and the one receiving it is left with many choices on how to perceive it:

• Bookmark, some users use services like Pocket or Instapaper to go back and read favorited tweets at a later time.
• Agreement with tweet/love it, the user sincerely enjoys the opinion and may or may not share the same opinion.
• Ending the conversation, no need to respond anymore.
• Sharing favorites, because favorites are public and anyone can see your favorited tweets, you give access to anyone to view.

While many celebrities will state in their profile, “Retweet is not an endorsement”, they fail to mention what a favorite means. I’d like to take Filip Lipev‘s take on what a Retweet is. Simply, “retweets mean take a look.” While a retweet can have a few different meaning, they all have the same underlying thread: agreement. Other potential takes on a retweet are:

• Take a look
• Simply sharing information
• Reciprocity, basically, you’ve retweeted me and I’ll return the favor.
• This needs more exposure, different from the favorite function, a RT will blast out the tweet to a greater network of followers.

Those of you reading through these reasons are probably saying to yourself, “whats the real difference?”

Therein lies my questioning!

While this may incite hashtags such as #FirstWorldProblems or #WriteBetterContent, I still cannot understand why a user would click one button and not the other.

My goal online, especially Twitter, is to get my content and opinions to as many users as possible. Now, I’m not expecting to be Justin Bieber, however, I do think I have far more depth than the majority of his tweets and opinions. I also don’t care to have millions of followers either.

The greatest purpose for me online, is to create engagement, start conversations and to build relationships. I cannot build a relationship with someone who just favorites my tweets and nothing else. Engage with me, re-share my content, get more tweeps involved in the conversation, share your own ideas, hell, some constructive feedback doesn’t hurt either!

At the end of the day, when you consider a favorite or a retweet, think about how the original poster will take it and how your action will add to the greater good of your network.

This has been a public service announcement made by @vincenzolandino.