Building a Dedicated Following

And the quest to be recognized in a virtual world

Pitching Into the Void

The internet is a beautiful thing. It has connected every stretch of the globe in an invisible network that allows us to communicate and do business with one another, to accomplish tasks that we could never do in our physical world, and to access a wealth of knowledge beyond anything you can find in your public library.

But the internet is also vast. Almost incomprehensibly vast similar to the infiniteness of our universe. Among the 7.7 billion people that inhabit this planet all clamoring for attention, it can seem impossible to actually make yourself heard. Yet, some of us who are brave enough (or perhaps foolish enough?) and who have the means to do so, try to do exactly that.

Some of us want to educate. Others want to inspire. Or, maybe they just have a good story to tell and hope that others will listen. Regardless of our motivations, we all must first overcome those initial feelings of doubt, anxiety, and fear that attempt to protect us from embarrassment and rejection when our voices and words fall on deaf ears. Indeed, because of the unlimited amount of information on the internet, our words may seem like they’re falling into a virtual void as soon as we hit the “Publish” button.

We all try to overcome this by building up our online following so that we can ensure that at least some people will actually read or listen to our stories.

But what’s the best way to go about doing this?

Should we just follow as many people as possible and hope they follow us back?

Let me offer an alternative based on the research I’ve done.

Don’t Follow Just to Be Followed

My philosophy when it comes to following other writers is quite simple: only follow those people that I have a genuine interest in reading their stories on a consistent basis. To understand why this is important, let’s first address whether following as many people as possible makes sense in terms of growing your own following.

In theory, from a pure numbers standpoint, following more people should net you at least some additional followers, assuming those individuals have the same “follow for follow” mindset. However, after perusing some writer’s profiles on Medium, it’s clear that following thousands of people doesn’t necessarily net you thousands of followers in return. In fact, for all your efforts of mindlessly clicking “Follow” on every profile page you come across, you might not pick up any additional followers.

Furthermore, even if you do somehow obtain thousands of followers from your efforts, there’s no guarantee that any of those new followers will actually read your stories. Some writers with a significant following have been generous enough to share their stories’ stats, and I realized that many of them didn’t exhibit any better stats in terms of views, reads, and claps than my own stories did (and I have substantially less followers than them).

So, what did I learn from this informal research of other writers?

I learned the importance of having dedicated followers who actually want to read my stories rather than individuals who are just looking to artificially inflate their numbers.

To put it simply, I rather have 100 dedicated followers than 1,000 undedicated followers, which reminds me of the expression, “I rather be loved by few than liked by many.” If I can count on those 100 followers to truly take an interest in my work, then I know I’ll always have an audience, and that’s what is important to me. I’m also more likely to retain those followers if they are dedicated to following each story I publish.

The number of followers is just a number after all. It is not an indicator of the greatness of a writer, so don’t feel bad if you’re struggling to increase your followers.

Instead, I recommend doing the following:

• Develop and hone your writing skills and habits.
• Network with other writers (e.g. Medium Mastery and Medium Partner Program Friends groups on Facebook).
• Learn as much as you can about the topics you’re interested in so you can become more of an expert.
• Read as much as you can from fellow writers who you genuinely enjoy reading their stories and feel like you can learn from.
• Submit your work to publications that are aligned with your writing interests.

And most of all, keep writing and don’t let a number get in the way of that.

I’d love to hear from you! What’s your philosophy on following others? What seems to have worked and what hasn’t for growing your online presence?

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