You wake up, look at your Twitter follower count and realize that the number still hasn’t gone up. You’re frustrated because you know potential employers check social media accounts to see which candidates have more influence. A quick Google search shows that you can buy thousands of followers for as little as $5! Sure, they’ll be eggs and not real people but that’s a deal you can’t pass up, right? Wrong. The only place you should buy eggs for under $5 is the grocery store. Never buy Twitter followers and here are a few reasons why:
1.) Twitter is based off of interaction and fake followers can’t engage.
Twitter is supposed to be a dialogue, not a monologue. If none of your followers are real, there will be no one to retweet and favorite your content. There will be no interaction between you and your followers for others to see and join in the conversation. You will have no followers suggesting to their friends or colleagues to follow you. Instead of creating a genuine experience you’ve created a black hole for your content to spiral into. From an outside perspective thousands of followers will look good but a good handful that will engage with you is worth much more.
2.) Buying followers is unethical.
If you want to have a successful career in public relations you have to remain ethical and honest. Buying Twitter followers is a form of lying, you’re deceiving everyone who looks at your profile into thinking you have more social media influence than you do. And just like with every lie, there is a high probability that you will get caught. If the amount of eggs in your followers list doesn’t give it away there are now apps that will tell someone how many of your followers aren’t real people.
3.) Most importantly when you buy your followers, you’re ruining your reputation.
Buying followers is the easy way out. When you buy followers you’re portraying yourself as someone who doesn’t know how to gain a genuine following. Social media is so important in a public relations professional’s career and instead of proving your worth, you’ve hired out. So while it may be easier to buy followers it’s so much more satisfying to be able to say that your hard work paid off and you’ve organically gained thousands of followers.
Now that you know what not to do, take a look at our Key Pointes program or full social media services if you need a little help growing your following organically!