Social media used to be all about numbers. Numbers of followers, Likes, shares. Even though they are still important, social media professionals and companies realized that quality is equally worth being worked on, if not more. Fans that actually stick to the brand, useful comments on posts, feedback are the high level of quality engagement that companies are looking for on social networks.
On Twitter, most people judge a person's influence by his or her number of followers. It is an important metric, but would you rather have 1 million non-engaged followers, or 100 active advocates of your brand or voice?
Here are some tips on how to gain quality and engaged followers on Twitter.
Follow the right people:
- follow the people you find interesting as of their tweets or field
- add them to a list: it will be easier for you to find them in the future in your following... and it is good for their ego!
- don't follow profiles that mention they "follow back"
Attract relevant followers to your profile:
- tweet articles that you or others wrote and that will be of interest for potential followers: use relevant hashtags so your tweets are found
- retweet tweets posted by people you want as followers
- tweet at them directly when they write something that you found useful, give genuine compliment, but don't ask for a follow or retweet
- ask them questions in their field of expertise
- follow and use hashtags they themselves regularly add in their tweets
- retweet articles of people they follow and engage with already
- participate in Twitter chats where they are regulars and engage with them through those
Once they follow you, keep engaging with them:
- thank for the follow (by DM or tweet)
- tweet at them an article you wrote when relevant to their field or interests
- retweet them once in a while
- thank if they retweet an important tweet of yours
By following those simple tips, you will gather engaged and faithful followers interested in what you have to say. Whether you are a company or an individual, they will be your real fans.