Get More Twitter Followers

Do you want more Twitter followers? People seem to believe they do. I wrote about how to get more Twitter followers a few years ago. To be honest, I don’t know what more followers gets you. It’s like living in Los Angeles versus living in Buffalo. There are more people in Los Angeles, but that doesn’t mean much. More followers doesn’t directly equate to more attention. Yes, there are some numerical advantages, but those seem to be tapering off. Keeping people feeling like they’re seen and heard seems to be the better strategy.

But, if it’s more Twitter followers you want, here’s my thinking.

How to Add Twitter Followers

1. Post unique information and insights 3-4 times a day.
2. Comment on other people’s tweets with relevant and non-spammy replies.
3. Occasionally post something way off-topic (for whatever reason, this works marvelously).
4. Reply 10-20 times a day (maybe more).
5. Look for great weekly chats (I’m fond of #blogchat by @MackCollier), and I co-host #ktco.
6. Have a great avatar photo (not an icon or logo), and a succinct bio.
7. Search Twitter for people talking about your passions, and connect with those people.
8. Devote 20 minutes a day (maybe more) to sharing up-and-coming people’s interesting posts.
9. Consider hosting a chat on Twitter yourself.
10. Give people enough room to retweet you with a comment. (see more on that here.)

Things You Might Do Less or Not At All

1. Never once mention (or think about, or worry about) your Klout score.
2. Never once think much about following “influencers.” Follow people who seem interesting.
3. Don’t worry about retweeting the big guys. They have plenty of exposure already.
4. If you have a “thanks for following” autoresponder, you’re bound to annoy many people, who will unfollow quite often.
5. Don’t buy into software or other inorganic methods to help you follow more people. They mostly help you follow bots and/or less-responsive people.
6. Don’t waste two to four hours a day on Twitter and call it lead generation. It’s the same as watching soap operas.
7. Don’t assume no response means anything. Sometimes, tweets don’t go through. Happens all the time, actually.
8. Don’t worry about who doesn’t follow you. Worry about creating interesting value.
9. Ask yourself whether your Foursquare check-ins belong in your tweet stream. (A personal peeve of mine, I admit, but ask whether they add value.)
10. Don’t tell people they’re doing it wrong. (Get the irony here?) P.S. you’re doing it wrong.

It’s Not Rocket Surgery

The challenge of Twitter and any of the social networks isn’t in figuring out how to gain bigger numbers than the other guy. The challenge is to get more active and clicking numbers, the kind of people who take the plunge when you mention something is happening. The kind of people who respond when you ask questions, and who hopefully you can respond to, from time to time, as well.

Do you want more Twitter followers? Connect more. Be there more. Be part of the story.

My question is this: when you get more followers, what is going to change for you? What do you suppose it will be like?

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