You can buy followers; did you know that?
Seems kind of ridiculous, but you can. There are people who swear by it and there are people who are utterly against it. Let’s go over a few things before I let you make your own decision.
First off, the amount of followers you have is directly visible to everyone on Twitter. No matter if your tweets are private or public, the amount of tweets, followers and people you are following are visible to the outside world. As a brand, even if you have an online marketing firm working on your social media or not, your Twitter strategy is an important aspect in building your brand. People are hesitant to follow brands if they do not have a fan base. Let’s face it, a majority of the start-up companies are of success but it’s tough to get followers when you aren’t paying for them. So the amount of followers you have is directly important to the brands image.
However, when it comes time to utilize those fans it’s almost impossible. You bought fans probably from the Philippines and these accounts that are following you are often ghost accounts or just phony people. So when it comes time to engage these fans and get conversation rolling, it’s almost impossible. This looks bad when people look at your tweets and see that you don’t interact with your fans. Twitter is all about engagement, and a user is on there to be engage and strike conversation. The fact that your brand is unable to gain conversation shows upon the overall image.
So we have a plus and a minus. Both cancel out, but when push comes to shove, it is my opinion that users are most likely to follow a brand if the number of people already following them is high. Does anyone really go back and check past tweets anyway? If you want to save money, just a little time and effort can avoid that and get fans that actually take part in Twitter activities.
About Nick Renna
I have a friend who runs one of these websites that undercuts the price of most competitors. I tested his “product” out on a Facebook fan page and received about 2500 new fans. However most seem to be from outside the US and I highly doubt any interact with my page, if in fact they are real people. On the plus side, I have probably received around 300 organic new fans since the test. If only more followers/fans meant a higher Edgerank!
Rather than buying fans, I would really prefer to grow my fan base organically. It not only saves me money, but it also gives me the opportunity to gauge my effectiveness in what I am doing. It may be a bit slow, but I know that in the long run, it’ll be worth it.
Hi Nick, there are two main reasons why I don’t buy followers.
1) It is not targeted
2) Social media marketing is not about numbers, it is about ROI
I can make both the above work without buying followers.
I can see why buying Twitter followers is an attractive proposition. Sometimes the boost in numbers can be the difference between someone following you organically and not. You should always build your fan base organically too, but I can see the benefits. Use wisely would be my advice, and even that depends on your definition of ‘wise’.
I wouldn’t recommend buying followers. These “people” don’t care about your brand and won’t be paying attention to your messages. It’s better to have a small follower count of real people that actually care and are more likely to convert.
Great debate. I agree with building the audience the organic and natural way. One at a time. I figure the rewards will be greater then. It amazes me to see Brands that have 14,000 twitter followers but there sites get 50 hit a month. Fake followers don’t interact. So I am going with the old slow process.
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