Bigger the better right? Isn’t that what we are always told from a young age? Ha! Actually being only 5’3″ tall, I’m a firm believer that the best things come in small packages. But I digress before I’ve even started.

I’m talking about our audience, our  potential clients and our potential customers. Surely the accounts on social media with the biggest followings are the best to subscribe to no? I had to question this myself earlier this  year when I was excitedly watching the speakers being announced for a large social media event. I would head on over to the speakers’ Facebook pages to seek out their nuggets of advice and see if I could learn anything new from them. These guys were being paid thousands of pounds to speak, I wanted to see for myself what these social media superstars were up to, what I had to aspire to.

Imagine my surprise when one of them had just over 300 likes on Facebook, a few of which I’m sure were on the back of appearing at this event. This guy was hugely successful at what he did yet his following was relatively small, well massively small.

Ask yourself this when you are participating in the likeladders on Facebook, or the followhours in Twitter or the #likeforalike in Instagram, what are you hoping to achieve? If it’s raising your number of followers to a certain level then please go ahead and participate to your hearts content, afterall we all like to be liked don’t we? However, if you are wanting to convert your new followers into customers and leads is this the right strategy to implement? I’m going to argue that NO IT ISN’T! Customers and new leads for your business come from those who interact with you, especially in this digital age, they come from those who feel they know you personally or have been recommended to connect with you. Word of mouth and being genuine on all of your accounts is worth so much more that gaining 10 new followers who will probably never interact with you again after that initial contact.

Think about your own purchasing journey. Do you buy from a new business you’ve found because they have a large follower base? I hope not! My own journey goes something like this – discover new brand – check out their reviews – see how often they are posting (so that if I contact them I can judge if they are likely to respond) – check if they have created their own content so i can see the passion they have for their business – consider all of these factors and potentially make a purchase.

BUT HOW DO I GET NEW FOLLOWERS? By creating regular content on all of your platforms that fits with your business and offers interesting articles / advice / engaging photos, video content is a major plus. It really is that simple!

Want to know how to connect with your true audience more meaningfully, click here to book a call with me