It shouldn't *really* be a surprise that people tweeting ad infinitum about social media techniques and tips should describe themselves as 'social media gurus', but the report from What's Next Blog shows how ridiculous this self-aggrandising chest thumping has got.

Over 180 thousand twitter users describe themselves as 'social media gurus' in some shape or form, with some of the worst perpetrators being those who modestly dub themselves 'warriors', 'mavens', and (strangely, given the industry's relatively nascency) 'veterans'.

What would be interesting would be to assess the *actual* guru-ness of these people. In my experience, accounts who boast such a title are often the worst culprits for spamming linkbait blogs repeating the same old nonsense - let's be honest, there is a genuinely finite amount you can write about how to run a good social media programme or engaging twitter account. It doesn't need a dozen posts a day to explain it. Furthermore, they often have tens of thousands of followers, but rarely a RT - they're not practising what they preach by means of engagement.

What really annoys me though is that these accounts follow people, then, within 24 hours, unfollow if they're not followed back, or unfollow you the moment you do so to them (when you get bored of being spammed crap blogs).

Twitter isn't about reciprocal follows, it's about following people you find interesting, funny, or informative; 'follow me if I follow you' is the wrong approach, yet so many self-styled 'social media gurus' do just that - harvesting followers to increase their perceived popularity.

We're all, individually and as an industry, constantly learning about the opportunities social media brings and finding new (and not always perfect) ways of using platforms in the best way possible. However, calling yourself a guru is perhaps arrogant at best and when you fail to grasp the basics, downright annoying.