As part of our ongoing professional development here at Coles Marketing Communications, we subscribe to a host of industry publications and share highlights from stories — relevant either to our clients’ industries or the improved practice of our craft — at our weekly staff meetings.

One of those publications is “Public Relations Tactics,” a monthly publication sent to members of the Public Relations Society of America.

As you can imagine, the conversation this past year has often turned to the world of social media: why it’s so important, what works, what doesn’t, what to do, what not to do, etc.  Here is a partial “don’ts list” aimed at those in the PR world, but I think everyone could take a lesson from it. These points come courtesy of PRSA and Twitter expert Sandra Fathi with some of my own thoughts intertwined:

• Hashtag hijacking: Taking advantage of popular trending topics (those words in Twitter posts with a “#” in front of them that make conversation topics easier to search) such as, say, the Indianapolis Colts,  to interrupt the conversation with your unrelated agenda such as, say, advertising your band’s gig on Friday night, is kind of like going to a dinner party and summarily inviting everyone to leave and come to your house … for a softball game. Not cool.

• False mentions: Including someone’s username in your tweet with an “@” in front of it will make that tweet show up in the person’s “mentions” tab in an attempt to grab their interest. PRSA calls this an “Ah! Made you look!” approach to marketing that makes people feel tricked. Also not cool.

• Misleading links: In the offline world, this goes by the name of “false advertising.” If you get people to click your link, look at a photo or watch a video by giving them false information (think of the subject lines in your e-mail’s spam folder … and then think about what’s actually in some of those e-mails!), you will anger your followers pretty quickly. Coolness factor: none.

• Mass follow: I’m reminded of  a line from Adam Sandler’s movie, “Funny People,” which I saw last weekend. I’m paraphrasing: In general, the more friends you have online, the fewer friends you have in real life. People use this tactic to try to amass a lot of followers in a short period of time. It’s not a good idea, in general, Fathi writes, to follow or be followed by a person advocating illegal activities or, if you’re a brand, controversial topics.

• Twitterns: Just because someone is a teenager/early 20s and knows how to tweet doesn’t usually qualify them to speak on behalf of a professional organization! Tweeting for a professional organization requires good judgment, understanding of company messaging and strategy, and representing the organization to the public in an appropriate manner consistent with those strategies.