I was perusing through my Twitter stream and noticed a couple of resolutions that involved increasing Twitter follower counts.
Of course, it looks impressive to have a bunch of followers, but shouldn’t the real goal be to get more conversions, responses, clicks, etc. from your followers and connect with them?
I remember when I first joined Twitter, I was real impressed with people who had followers with 5 digits or more. As I started gaining more followers myself, I began to realize the low percentage of people who actually clicked or interacted with my tweets.
Of course there are things you can do to improve those statistics. For example, posing questions to your followers is a great way to engage them. Also, throwing a fun/personal tweet in from time to time will also help showcase your personality.
Nevertheless, I still think people get too caught up in the numbers of friends, followers, subscribers, etc. in general. There’s nothing wrong with setting goals like this, but also follow up with goals regarding conversions and engagement.
You could have 50,000 Twitter followers, but how valuable are they if they don’t engage in discussions, respond to your tweets, or buy products (if selling is your goal)?
What do you think? Are we too obsessed with our follower counts? Also, what do you do to engage your followers? After all, that’s really the whole point of using Twitter. It’s not a popularity contest.
I was discussing this a couple of days ago with a fellow Twitter user. I was telling him that having 100 followers who you interact with and exchange on a regular basis is more valuable than having 1000 that are just making noise in your timeline.
He just couldn’t see the point and was adamant: a large Twitter follower count was all he was interested in.
Well, I guess he won’t be on Twitter in 6 month time.
It has been my observation the tweeter count gives a false impression among tweeters. Tweeter followings are just numbers, they don’t really amount to anything, unless one is really popular–like celebrities. 🙂
Thanks for the nice article, actually I’m not abessed but I follow too much and my follow link is abessed in fact 🙂
I use to be obsessed until I realized who my real followers were. I admit I am always trying to find ways to build my followers but at the same time I want followers that will respond. I think when we are new bloggers we quickly get caught up in the numbers game but eventually learn what’s really important.
So true, I think this is a knock-on from myspace where it seemed at one point the whole point of myspace was to simply collect friends. Twitter has an an entirely different function, it seems however that that hasn’t been fully grasped by some.
Well I definitely agree with you on that one and I for one will put my hand up and say that in the early days I was completely brainwashed into keeping a tab on numbers and I now feel that in some ways I’ve wasted valuable time doing this. One of the issues being we should spend a certain amount of time in looking to grow targeted numbers and promoting products or services using the numbers we already have, test the water if you like.
I’ve always been advised that if you don’t have a great number then don’t emphasise on it as this can damage your reputation! To some degree that may be true if someone comes along and notices that you have only 25 Twitter followers or 10 RSS readers they may well turn a blind eye. Regardless to say that numbers are important to a certain degree, but targeted numbers will more or less determine how well you convert.
Lots of people following me on twitter but no one come to check my blog posts. Now I need to do consider some people!
I have a twitter account but not understood peoples why they are not checking my blog post which tweeted in my twitter account.then why they follow me ……..?
Now there are those who sell twitter followers, so the twitter count doesn’t mean that much anymore. Building a community on Twitter is easy if you are giving something away or you offer expert advice in any domain
The purpose of twitter is for you to have followers. And it is easy to make friends in twitter. Especially when you are into internet marketing.
Twitter is a social networking site to communicate to each other. I really like to use twitter. I am a regular member for this site.
I must admit I was one of those people who was obsessed with twitte followers until I saw how little buying traffic I got from all the effort I as putting out. But I am not giving up on twitter, but I am making my tweets morefocused, and campaign oriented.
I really like this post, because it reminds me that keeping it real is always the way to go.
I will admit, I sometimes look at how many followers I have. I don’t have many and that doesn’t bother me. I do not tweet that much personally. When I do, I try to ask questions to engage or bring up topics that relate to the community of people I socialize with
I totally agree with you Lisa, actually we don’t really pay attention to our followers or their links.
@Irfan I don’t know if it’s because we are selfish, because if you follow a lot of people and most of them post things which don’t interested you, you won’t read them because you will waste your time.
What I can do is to follow only people i am really interested in, then I read all my followers’s links 🙂
i’m agree with you and thats ture we don’t care about our followers links or whom we follow. because we all are selfish we want just our favor not others.
I used to be 🙂 but I guess at some point I got a bit of twitter burn out – I do agree that quality of your followers and response to your tweet are more important then count.
I just want to thank you for the tip that you give I’m a graphic/web designer. Even tho I do more graphics than web stuff but I never thought about about make money with a blog. Until I saw your youtube videos guess I was happy with the freelance money I was making but know I have found a new avenue. Once again I just want to say thank you, if you like you can check out my blog: http://tee2designs.blogspot.com/ if you have any feed back I would like to hear it
Even though it’s just a statistic, the Twitter followers number builds your trust in the online community. It’s true that most of those followers don’t interact as much as they should. Not everyone uses Twitter 24 hours/day and most of them follow too many people at a time. A good tweet gets lost many times that way
Lisa, you’re absolutely right… too many people are completely obsessed with numbers and ignorant of real statistics that actually mean something. In fact if you spend any time on twitter and learning about the network you’ll find that ANYONE can have 50,000 followers if they wanted to… it doesn’t require having quality content or valuable tweets whatsoever, there are so many people that just want numbers that it’s all about follow/following and not at all about engaging.
However, it is still possible to build a valuable twitter network by actually engaging with the followers you do have, and not worrying about the numbers. You connect with one person daily, and you’ll find that your network will grow!
I think twitter is so full of spammers right now that it could be the very downfall of the network (find out what I mean in my comluv link!) … see ya!
i’m agree with you and thats ture we don’t care about our followers links or whom we follow. because we all are selfish we want just our favor not others.
Exactly it is not about the number of followers, but the quality of followers. If not one is taking part in discussion then it means you can’t get any benefit from them.
Hi Lisa, an eye opener. I was obsessed with my Twitter follower count for a long time, but when I got to know that I was not getting a fair amount of traffic from it and no conversions at all from them, I stopped worrying about the numbers. Now I am participating in discussions and my traffic from Twitter is slowly increasing.
So true indeed!
I currently have just over 500 followers, and I’m getting only 4 – 5 daily hits from Twitter.
That’s why I stopped trying to get more followers, until I have the time to actually work on socializing with my Twitter followers. So for the time being I won’t be adding anymore..
I feel the same way about facebook – too many people are caught up in how many people are fans of their company, or “like” their product on facebook. However, this isn’t truly your customer base; there is no conversion to sales. Just because you have 50,000 fans, it doesn’t mean a single one will become a customer. You’re better off targeting a more specific group of people, and going for quality not quantity.
I am using Twitter for a while and getting some traffic from there. However, it’s very useless and don’t convert any click into sale.
i set up a twitter acct for one of my sites, had about 1000 followers but no sales, sign-ups or anything…just followers…which seems to be the “in thing” on twitter. doubt i’ll use twitter again. maybe it works for celebs or something.
I am the first to admit that I read way more blogs than I actually blog for myself. So I am one of those ones that click on the tweeted links. But I agree with Kharim with how it’s better to have 100 followers that will click your tweeted links vs having 10000 followers that MAY give you 5 clicks or so. Looking at my statistics and traffic, very few of my clicks come from Twitter. So you either have to increase the amount of times you tweet (which can be annoying to a person like me that actually clicks on the links.) the link or you be EXTREMELY choosy with whom you choose to allow to follow you.
Hi Lisa!
I LOVE reading articles on quality over quantity of followers/fans/subscribers/etc and I could not agree more with it. I recently disabled my auto-follower on Twitter and unfollowed a bunch of people because I want to focus on quality and engagement of my Twitter followers. Not only is it a no-brainer over playing the numbers game, it’s just way more enjoyable too. Who wants to sign-in to Twitter and read a spammy Twitter homepage of robot tweets from 56,000 followers? Not me.
ALSO, speaking of Twitter… I have to thank you for the excellent Final Cut tutorials you referred to me over Twitter the other day. No instead of staring blankly at my computer screen, I’m actually learning how to use it 😛 so thanks!
And Elise, that’s exactly what drew me to your blog. I absolutely love your emphasis on keeping it real and quality!
Glad the Final Cut Express tuts helped you. It’s really a powerful piece of software! Love it.
When I started using Twitter, I always wanted to have lots of followers because I thought that they’re interested to my tweets. I realized that it doesn’t matter if you only have few followers as long as they’re interacting in discussions. I’m happy because even though I only have few followers, we always have valuable and great discussions.
I just realized I had my twitter ID wrong (Lol). It’s health_stuff not health_facts.
I think I can honestly say that I don’t care that much about my Twitter follow stats. I have 19 people following me now and I’m thinking “oh well.” More will come when they realize how great I am. Lol. But seriously, twitter can be a great way to get more traffic but it’s not my primary way.
Automation is making this more true than ever! Many of my followers come on board via location and keyword based searches. I’m based in Southern California but a recent tweet about Atlanta brought me several automated follows from that region. Its not likely that our interaction (if any) will be fruitful.
On the other hand, I have several followers locally that I interact with regularly. I’d rather have 20 followers like that than 1000 that I never engage.
I’ve read a post about that sometime ago @ another blog.
The question was “Does anyone really read my posts?” and after I’ve read it, I thought for a moment. Do they Really?
To come back to what you said, I rather have a small amount of people that really engage in the conversation, then having a bunch of followers that never read my stuff.
It does make sense, doesn’t it?
Regards,
Dev
Lisa, I’m in total agreement. There are thousands of people out there littering the twitter landscape. They follow people and people follow them back. You can follow people all day until you get into the thousands of followers. Then you might think if I tweet something 5000 people are going to see it, and if they retweet it even more are going to see it. But this is a huge fallacy. Anybody that has over a few hundred followers are probably not going to see your tweet. It’s going to race by and be buried in seconds. I had an account with about 300 followers. Within 5 minutes there would be nearly a hundred tweets. Too many to read.
I used to be really into my follower count but now I realise producing content for my blogs is far more important. I think it’s the same sort of thing with spending too much time looking at rival blogs.
Great point, Lisa! I think the key with Twitter, as with other social media, is to keep it real. Follow people you are interested in, share helpful or interesting info by tweeting articles or retweeting, engage in relevant conversation, etc.
I’ve been actively using Twitter for about 2 months now, and I’ve found that my number of followers (as well as click thrus to my website and retweets of my posts) is growing naturally as I use the above methods.
I really appreciate your emphasis on avoiding gimmicks. It is so easy to get sidetracked with those type of things, even though they add very little value!
I used to think the same that the more followers you have the more traffic you will get to your site after tweeting a link.
We have to remember that our followers are not only following our tweets but the tweets of others as well, so our tweets might get lost and may never be seen by some of our followers.
It’s best to have 100 followers who really and truly follow us than to have 10,000 followers and non of them click through to your site.
I’m not obsessed with my followers count anymore but i used to be. I agree with Ulrich on how to create relationship with other twitterers. If this is not done twitter activities is almost useless now as people don’t really read the tweets anymore.
Facebook gives me more visitors than twitter.
Likewise, I was impressed when I saw non-celebraties having 2,500+ followers and I wasn’t aware of who they were. I only follow people who are amusing, interesting or are likely to have a good conversation at heart with you.
It’s just sad that people automate their posts though. I used to but have stopped now.
Great post Lisa!
I don’t use twitter or facebook for my website yet. Maybe I should, but social media is kind of about being social with your friends isn’t it. If your regular website is good, won’t other people tweet or talk about it on facebook for you? Just wondering.
I used to be obsessed with Twitter followers; I even signed up to one of those sites that automatically allows you to follow people and vice versa. I deleted all of who I followed and slowly after that, they deleted me and I’m fine with that.
I only follow people who I find interesting – it could have absolutely zilch to do with what I blog about. I have only 205 followers, a lot are spam but I’m fine with that. I have better success with my Facebook fan page.
Great Post as usual Lisa.
I work on increasing my Twitter Follower Count a lot. It’s not really about the number, it’s more about one more person that will see my tweets. I eventually will go through and clean everything up. But for now I get most of my traffic through Twitter, so to get any traffic I need to keep raising my Twitter Followers.
Hi Lisa,
I totally agree with your statement that twitter isn’t a popularity contest. When I started using it I thought that I should be getting thousands of followers, but I soon realized that Twitter traffic really doesn’t convert like search engine traffic or even Facebook traffic for that matter. When it comes down to spending time on Twitter or making money with other sources – I stick with the other sources. I get on Twitter just to make an appearance, but not to sell anything.
Hi Lisa,
I found your site because Brankica posted a link on her page. Nice to meet you!
I really agree with you on this. Actually, I think this same thing holds true with any social media where your goal is something other than traffic.
Bloggers often talk about generating as much traffic as possible in order to generate sales or email signups or whatever. But, the point is not to get as much traffic as possible, it is to generate something else. I think that thought gets lost in much of the current conversation.
I am a very big fan of Twitter, though I don’t have that large of a followers list. And I don’t really want a large list. I want a list of people who are interested in communicating.
The idea is that when I tweet something, I want it to be noticed instead of just being one of the 400 that were included in someone’s list of the 100K people they are following at that moment.
And, I want to look at my list and see things that I am interested in. Call me old fashioned, but I still like social media to be social.
Have a good day!
i agree with your points, as well as the should and could.
i believe many do it because of social proof. to see is to believe, and that has quite a value in itself from a marketing / perception point of view. it comes down to objective / purpose. for many, social proof is the objective, and thus higher counts on widgets become a focus.
I think that Twitter followers are kinda like the web 2.0 hit counter. Yeah, it’s great if you have a ton of followers, but if they don’t convert into anything what does it matter? I’d rather have 20 great, active followers than 1,000 spambots on Twitter.
Hi Lisa: This past year, I tried to create more of a sense of community with my followers. I don’t auto followback and I try to find people who can add to my knowledge base about website building, mompreneurs and my own interest in transforming lives through stress management. I have fun with twitter and try to reply and RT as much as I can without interferring with my work. TweetDeck helps with that. Your point is a great one that more is not necessarily better, it is quality not quantity that counts best!
Hey Lisa,
loved that you blogged about this.
I am not obsessed and after learning how Twitter works, I kinda don’t care. I prefer having 100 followers that will interact with me, than 5.000 that don’t read my Tweets.
I even unfollowed a bunch of people lately that had nothing of interest to say.
You are completely right about people missing the point, less followers with more interaction is better than the other way around.
Hi Lisa,
I totally agree that it really doesn’t matter if you have 100,000 followers if none of them ever respond, click anything or even remotely notice that you exist.
Of course, like everyone, I’d like to increase my Twitter following, but that’s something I want to happen naturally – I don’t want to go off on following sprees just so people can follow me back – I want them to follow because they want to connect and stay in touch with me – not simple because an app auto-followed me back.
I don’t post very many personal tweets, but I do make an effort to share other’s content, to reply to questions and otherwise interact with others on Twitter.
Hello Lisa,
Recently I have taken a different approach with my Twitter account. When someone follows me I personally go through a number of their tweets and see if there is something interesting for me.
Once I find something, I will reply to them and mention something in connotation to that tweet, thus starting a discussion.
Sometimes I find really interesting things and then I will consider RT’ing it. It helps to see if they reply, which may make them worthy to follow too.
In many cases these people have many followers themselves and if their follower base is “quality” (so to speak) they often tend to follow me too. I just repeat the process with them.
I also do this with people I intend to follow before I actually follow them to see if they interact with their followers.
The amount is not as important as the relationship you have with them.
I do a lot of what you mentioned as well. Good tips Ulrich.
I wrote about this sometime ago also..Facebook does an better job of getting you clicks versus Twitter..I think because a lot of people Tweets are on auto pilot sadly to say..and no ones really reading anything.
“Black Seo Guy “Signing Off”
I’ve stopped using Twitter as much for the same reason. I used to think “everybody is on Twitter, that’s where I need to be” … until I saw the poor results I’ve had using it.