When I first joined Twitter, I thought I would eventually become one of those people with 100,000 followers and end up following only 100 people. I was able to get as far as 1,667 followers while only following 12 people. However, the number 1,667 didn’t change for months. On some days, I would gain a follower and have 1,668 followers. It always seemed as I would lose one follower the very next day.
This is the path I took for months. It seemed as if no matter what I did, I would remain stuck with only 1,667 followers forever without any signs of improvement. I tried everything I could to get more followers except what I was very reluctant to do: follow others. One day, all of the frustration piled on until I made my move: I started following others.
Following others also led me to following back. As my following count soared, I started to get more followers. All of a sudden, I got almost 100 followers. Then I got 194 followers in one day. Then I settled at a consistent 30 followers every day. Getting 30 followers every day was a lot better than being stuck at 1,667.
As my following continues to grow, I decided to ask myself how I was able to get the big following by following others and why I wasn’t able to get the big following by only following 100 people. After some thought, the answer became clear, and it applies for a lot of people on Twitter right now.
The reason I was stuck at 1,667 followers for a long time was because people did not know me. The best way to get people to know who you are is by following them and hoping for a follow back. As more people get to know you, your will build a bigger following. That’s how I went from being stuck to gaining 30 followers a day to gaining hundreds of followers every day.
People need to know about you. By following people on Twitter, you are telling them that you are on the web. When enough people follow you back, and you continue to tweet consistently, your presence on the web becomes powerful and extraordinary.
I used Twiends and increased the number of people I followed (and I did that selectively) and, yes, I got lots of follow-backs. But many of them unfollowed after a day or so. Twiends does have a reputation for high follower churn
That’s one thing I found with Twiends as well. The feature packages work for growing your number, and for me, a good percentage of them would be targeted since these people want to grow their social media audiences. However, for most people, Twiends will just boost your number and not result in more targeted followers which are the ones that matter the most.
Hi Marc,
A great post, and well worded. I do have a concern, however. What is it we offer our followers aside from a followback? In a sense, they are consumers in relation to our content. And as we know, it is imperative to offer value to our targeted audience.
So while having any number of followers is a consideration, would you agree that the most important consideration we can have is what we are offering them to be such?
Keep up the great work!
Gregory
@Grannelle
We offer our followers with valuable content that they can learn from, be inspired by, and/or be entertained by. The content we provide for our followers impacts the likelihood of them sticking around. The content we provide is important. They chose to read our social media posts so providing them with value is the right thing to do.
I absolutely agree with you and dis has been my experience as well. Nice piece.
Thank you Ayo. I am happy to hear that you liked the article.