How to get 10,000 Followers – Fast!

How to get 10,000 followers – Fast!

A common question often asked by clients is:“How can I get to 10,000 followers?” I will often meet this question with a wry smile and invite them to discuss their business goals and see where 10,000 followers fits into that vision. Often having 10,000 followers can actually do you more harm than good.

Your voice gets lost in 10,000 followers. In the simplest terms it gets split 10,000 different ways.

If, however, you’re talking to a small group of people it feels more intimate, more connected. This concept is not lost on the Facebook and Instagram algorithms.

Take as a theoretical example 2 identical businesses competing for business in a small town. Both use social media and take different approaches. Approach one is a spray and pray approach. Building high numbers of followers in the vague hope that they will attract more business. This is not the smart approach. If, for example, you are a restaurant owner in a small town in Ireland having 9,000 American instagram followers will do nothing for you as a business.

Example two (a real example I am using with a client at the moment) is where intelligent strategy comes into play to work for the business owner. Example 2 owns a restaurant and a boutique hotel in a small town in rural Ireland. Sceptical about the ability for social media to improve his business I set up an Instagram account for him and used detailed analytics to create a network for him that solely focused on people living within a commutable distance. A small network of a few hundred people, but all people who genuinely interacted with the client and were potential customers.

The results spoke for themselves. Business in the restaurant increased. Sales increased. Suddenly the concept that social media could deliver customers was not such a fanciful idea.

The same principle of less volume more quality can be seen with content creation. Accounts that produce samey, tired and spammy adverts again and again leave social media users disinterested and tired. Put up an interesting, inspiring or original piece of authentic content though and you will see a marked increase in interaction and reach.

There are exceptions to the rule. If, for example, you are an e-commerce business and have a sales funnel built directly from social media to your website then a large following is advantageous. If you are building a theme page in the hope that you will be able to monetarize the following you have then it’s a numbers game definitely. Always remember though: any business needs to connect with their target customers. All else is secondary to this principle.

In a constantly changing world sometimes to be at the front means to embrace the counter-intuitive. To go against established logic and to actually take a minute to think through the impact of the opposite of the prevailing logic. To take the road not taken.

– James Surginor.