(bright music)
- [Instructor] Would you rather eat an organic apple
or a robot apple?
I mean, the robot apple is shiny.
(metal clinks) Ow!
On second thought, I think I'm going to go
with the organic apple.
And the same can be true for followers.
(air whooshes)
Nowadays, there's plenty of services that offer you
followers or the ability to mass follow accounts
for a price, but are these services really worth it?
And do the followers you acquire for them actually engage?
(logo whooshing)
Well, it might seem like a great idea
to quickly gain a bunch of followers this way,
but the truth of the matter is that's actually not.
(logo whooshing)
So, let's go over some cons about buying followers.
First at buying followers can pollute your audience
with followers that most likely are bots,
or if you're using an app to mass follow people,
they most likely are just following you back
out of social media etiquette,
and not because they are truly interested in your content.
And because of this,
they are extremely unlikely to actually engage
with any of your posts, (logo whooshing)
leaving you with a high follower account,
but no actual traction. (logo whooshing)
Next up buying followers can also obscure your analytics
and make it hard to actually use data to determine
who your audience really is,
because the large amount of your followers aren't engaging.
It can be extremely hard to tell what the engaged part
of your audience likes, their age range, their gender,
what language they speak, and even where they are located.
All data that can be extremely handy in helping you
shape your future content and how to talk to your followers.
(logo whooshing)
Also, if your followers aren't actually sharing
and engaging with your content,
it can have negative effects on your organic reach.
(logo whooshing)
In order to grow your following organically,
you need your followers to share your content
so you can reach even more potential followers.
This is really key to growing fast and finding followers
that have similar interests. (logo whooshing)
You also might be surprised to learn that it can affect
any paid ads you might try to run as well.
As the algorithms will attempt to show your ad
to other accounts that are similar to your followers.
So if your followers are a bunch of robots,
well, you're just going to be paying to advertise
to other robots. (coins chimes)
Next up, it can also be a huge hindrance when trying
to land sponsorships,
as a sponsor might initially be impressed
by the amount of followers you have,
but once they see your audience, isn't really engaging.
It's likely they won't be very interested
in working with you.
Same goes for attempting to sell a product
or use affiliate links.
If your audience isn't actually interested in you
and your brand, they won't be willing to buy anything.
(logo whooshing)
For example,
my YouTube channel last stash TV
has over 28,000 subscribers, which is pretty impressive.
However, because its content is all over the place.
And because I used apps to generate subscribers,
the audience there, isn't very engaged.
Despite filling my video description with affiliate links
and Teespring products, I've never made a dime on any of it.
I've also never been able to successfully attract a sponsor
because the audience engagement just isn't there.
However, on my new channel Film At Yourself,
despite only having around 370 ish subscribers
at the time of recording this,
I've already made $60 and 81 cents in affiliate links.
$344 and 96 cents and Patreon support
and have had a few sponsorships.
All with a small but engaged audience.
If you're really struggling to attract followers early on,
consider asking your friends and family to follow you
and share your posts.
This grassroots approach can lead
to more and more organic growth
as they hopefully share and engage with your content.
And finally, sometimes apps that allow you to mass follow
or buy followers are actually prohibited
by several social media's terms of use.
So using their services could get your account banned
or even deleted.
Now that you know this cautionary tale
about buying followers,
you can focus on better building your organic growth
and hey, it can take a long time.
So be patient keep posting and don't fall
into the robot money trap. (logo whooshing)
Oh, look at that shiny pair.
(metal clinks) Ow!
Oh man, another fruit bot.
(bright upbeat music)