Follower for follower - Why I think this is a bad idea
I seem to be in a particularly disagreeing mood this afternoon, which makes this the perfect time to share a post that I wrote a few days ago (but didn't publish yet). Here goes.
We see these kind of posts and comments, begging for followers, pop up all around us lately and I don't think it is a positive thing.
It is an understandable thing though. People who just joined Steemit want to earn and they want to earn big. They will think more followers is key in this. While this is partially true, there is more nuance to this.
The follower for follower method
You have gathered a big amount of followers from all over Steemit. You've begged people to follow you through comments and direct messaging. You've joined every 'Followers train' you could find. Even after gathering 400+ followers, your posts earn under $1 almost every time. This is because, although you have many followers, they aren't particularly interested in the topics you write about. These followers have applied the same tactics as you. In that way, they have gathered a huge amount of followers aswell and in doing so, they are now also following a lot of other people. Your posts get lost in their Home feed, because there are simply too many for them to keep up with and the quality they see there isn't the best, so why should they even check it anymore? They don't upvote your content.
The hard worker and consistent good quality method
You write many posts about the topics that interest you. You enjoy writing these posts and you enjoy the discussions they spark. You don't get new followers very quickly, but the followers you gain are interested in your posts. They follow you for how you write and what you write about. Whenever they see you appear in their feed, they click your post, read your article, comment and upvote your content. You might have started out with less than $1 payout on your first articles, even though they were good quality. However, you see the payout prices rising slowly, but consistently. Your followers grow and the comments on your posts increase. You have loyal followers and are building meaningful relationships.
The nuance in the quantity vs quality in followers is not clear to everyone yet and I think it should be made clearer. I ignore most of the comments that say "I followed you, pls follow back", but I feel I could be doing more. I honestly don't have the energy or patience to reply to each and every one of them though, so when I noticed another one of these 'Follower train' posts, I decided to comment there instead.
"I think this is a bit of short-term thinking. How much are these followers worth if they don't like the topics you write about? They won't comment, they won't upvote. And on the other side, you now follow many people who write about a lot of subjects that you might not care about at all. So now your Home feed is filled with articles you don't find interesting. The people you follow for their content get lost inside this feed, so you risk missing interesting articles and they don't get the upvotes you think they deserve."
I gave my comment a 1% upvote, which is mostly enough to reach the top in these kind of posts. I'm thinking I should try to reply to more of these of posts, because in that way, I will reach more people and I will find the target audience I'm trying to reach.
What do you think? How do you handle those kind of comments?
Closing notes
Why I felt this was the perfect time to share this post? Here are a few reasons why:
Not to mention the private messages I get on Steemit.chat. And guess what! Just today I received a private message on Discord aswell. It's expanding...
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Yes yes yes, i was just thinking about this today, prompted me to ask a question in regards to unfollowing. The trend of newbies following a ton of folks to gain a huge following but when as you point out, instances after the "follow me then ill follow you" happens im sure its overwhelming to try and engage with all those youve asked to follow back.
I came across a new account where the person was following 14000+ folks... i was like how in the heck you gonna engage with even a quarter of those folks. Idk.🤔
What i do know though is Slow and steady always works in the long run. SteemIt is a new and exciting platform with great rewards and everybody trying to figure out how to benefit.
Great points you made.
Thank you for your great comment! Yeah, that sounds like this person was just trying to rebuild the New feed on his Home feed! That does not let you get to know anyone, because you'll be missing everything from everyone!
Hi @playfulfoodie
Post engagement is what all Steemians want, but some fail to realise that for people to engage with your you, they must be interested in what you are talking about.
I don't really blame people who take part in follow for follow, they don't know anything about blogging or building an audience, if some were told that they would own a blog they would probably laugh at the person who told it to them.
But @ned came and changed everything and very soon almost everyone on earth would own a blog.
This is one of the reasons i started my #blockchain-blogger series two weeks ago and since then i have seen a 50%+ growth in my follower base, and i am very sure all those people have a keen interest in what i am blogging about.
This would not be so i did follower begging.
Thanks @playfulfoodie for this post, i was considering making a post on follower begging, i will drop my next #blockchain-blogger post instead.
Resteemed
@ogochukwu
Ooh that sounds like a great initiative!
You're right, having an engaging audience is a goal we all aim for. I love to read comments from my frequent visitors, because I know they care about my blogs.
I also understand that not everyone knows how it all works. It is part of the reason why I posted this. They will not learn if no one tells them otherwise. I think our Steemit community as a whole is nice enough to educate people, so I hope they will all learn better ways of building a following in the future. That way, everyone can connect with like-minded people :-)
Thank you very much for your comment and the resteem!
This.
Thank you for saying this. I can publicly declare that I involved myself in the You Follow Me I Follow You train and it was part of fun, really.
The numbers don't count to me.
I see everyone as a human. Each one typing away, reading, and glancing through words. So it's a fun way to connect. But it quickly gets boring.
Because, like you said, that's the reason for the $1 post (for those who care). Personally, for me it is how well they react to my content is what matters.
Otherwise I have no problems with folks asking me to follow them. I do it all the time. It doesn't benefit them much, obviously. And, like me, they will learn with time.
Or through posts like this... they get to see beyond the train tactics. :)
Thank you for your great comment! We all have to figure out what works for us and what doesn't. I just hope some of these posts help others in their journey :-)
Definitely with you here! This is a nice community we have here. <3
The Follower count doesn't make you earn any more money, it just makes you look really dumb when your post gets 2 upvotes but you have around 1000 followers. Followers hat don't upvote are worse then no followers at all.
Exactly my point, thank you! :-)
If my followers would vote(nah doesn't matter.)
I think the followers who follow you for your posts are still more likely to vote than the other kind of followers.
Speaking for myself though, I'm already following too many people, so I don't notice every good post my favorite authors share :-(
We are still only in Beta ofcourse, but that's one of the problems i have to go through all the material and love to see new stuff from new people.
i wonder, i wonder!
Yes exactly! I think we really need more filtering options, before we should even want to go viral.
I agree. It is tough to find things sometimes. I feel like there is a lot I am missing, but I'm just getting started so that may be just me.
I think it's very confusing for new people to see some ordinary posts earn alot of money and get tons of upvotes. There are also alot of schemes to add followers, buy upvotes, and get noticed by these "whales" that have much weight.
For new joiners to the community it seems like you have to work at getting noticed so I don't know if it's not too judgemental to question their methods of trying to be successful, those methods may evolve over time.
Also, some of us write on a variety of topics so would naturally gain a variety of followers. I'll follow you because I like food and I enjoy analysis of how the steem community operates.
Thank you very much for your comment. I agree with you that it might be very confusing. When I first joined, Steemit was quite confusing for me aswell. All I did was post, upvote and comment and ignore most 'About Steemit' posts, because there was so much to learn. The extra knowledge of the inner workings of Steemit comes with time and I hope this is the same for all of our new members aswell. Atleast those patient enough to stick it out.
I did not write this post to make newcomers feel bad, I wrote it to make a point and to hopefully educate new members. The copy/paste comments in which people beg for followers (without even reading the article) are not only annoying to many people, they are also harmful for the people writing them. There is not only a risk of getting ignored, but people can also flag (downvote) them, which harms their reputation.
I sometimes reply to a private message to explain this to them, but in all honestly, I don't feel like doing that a lot. This post is easier for me, because it can be read by everyone.
I'm learning a lot from just reading the comments. Thank you!
You are right.
It does not matter the number of followers you have, what matters is the rich content of your posts.
Exactly! I know it takes a long time to build up a meaningful following and it can get frustrating sometimes, but it'll pay off in the long run and you'll enjoy the platform loads more that way :-)
Yh.
Upvoted!
Thank you :-)
Excellent post! There is no quick success :))
Exactly! Thank you very much :-)
I think I would just flag such comments. If just enough people would flag those things, would that not make it a little better?
After all it's nothing more than spam no? And spam must be flagged!!
Peace out Sister and new Followee (yes everybody is a brother or sister to me)
I definitely understand the appeal, but with many people saying 'Why post on Facebook if you can earn money by doing the same thing on Steemit', people will see this as its equal, meaning a simple social media site where they can post cat memes for 'likes'.
I think we should try to educate first, tell them it doesn't really work like that here. If after that, they continue doing so, there's always flagging as a plan B :-)
Great post! Please follow back! I'm just kidding... ^^ I've never added one of these young blood sucking vampires. I love your articles, they always contain so true and honest thoughts. Have a nice weekend with many positive inspirations ;)
Thank you! No, I haven't either, but I do feel that some of them really just don't know better yet (doesn't go for everyone I'm sure).
I'm so happy to hear you like my articles! I hope you have a great weekend :D
I agree with you.
At first I also thought I would need many followers. But then I saw that most of the posts did not interest me. And the interesting contributions go under.
And so I started to unfollow some people.
I think many new members want to build something quickly. But they do not know what that will be.
I am happier with a few, who like my contributions, than 1000 followers, which my contributions do not look at.
Sorry for bad english ^^
Thank you so much for sharing your experience! That is exactly why I wrote this post, because I think it might help people understand that it might not be the best thing to have a huge following in that way.
Your English is fine!
I hope you are right!
But I think most people don´t want to understand.
They are blind and deaf.
Blinded by the money. And deaf for true words.
But i hope you are right and i am wrong!
Wish you a nice day! :)
The beauty of it is, the people who don't want to understand (or don't care) probably won't make it very far here :-)
I agree, but we will see. Maybe the take over .. Haha... i just kidding :D