Q. How can I get more followers?A. I would ask, why do you want more followers? Let's first look at what a "follower" actually is on Twitter:
- a real person who might be genuinely interested in what you/your organization has to say
- a person who believes in "reciprocity", ie following you just because you followed them, even though they most likely have no interest in what you have to say
- a "robot" account, like an automated feed
- a spammer who follows you in hopes you will follow them so they can send you direct message spam and flood your timeline with their spammy tweets
- one of those people who fall for the "16,000 followers in 90 days" scam
If you are looking for just pure numbers of followers, and you do not mind spam, then sign up for one of the programs that promises large number of followers in a short period of time. But keep in mind the chances that any of your tweets will actually be read or retweeted will be very slim, even with huge numbers. Worse than that, you will be wasting your time sending tweets thinking real people are actually reading them.
Now, if the kind of followers you are looking for are #1 in the list above, heck, you will even settle for #2 in the list, then there are many ways to get followers. But here is how you get started:
Follow Others. Follow as many users as you can that might be interesting to you based on their tweets and/or profile. Do not follow blindly. If you follow a user, have a reason. Remember, you are limited to the number of users you can follow in one day (see twitter.com's help section for limit rules). Some of these users will follow you back and you will start to build your following.
Remember following is not the same as "becoming friends" with someone. It is a very loose arrangement where you elect to receive anothers status updates in your timeline. That is it. Do NOT get offended when people unfollow you and do not feel guilty for unfollowing others. This process will ultimately allow you to form many strong relationships, personal and/or professional, with Twitter which is why you are using Twitter in the first place. Isn't it?
