Paying for Twitter “followers”
Monday, July 6th, 2009The BBC has published an interesting article about a company offering Twitter “followers.”
The “followers” can be bought in batches of 1,000, with 100,000 being the biggest amount available.
All have opted in to be a “follower,” so is it a problem? All are profiled and those located closest can be prioritised, so it is targeted to some degree.
uSocial, which offers a paid service, estimates that everyone that follows is worth about 10 cents (Australian I believe) a month to a client.
I think even so big companies, indeed anyone that employs such as service, are missing the point of social networking: interaction.
Hard sell or just selling is not social media although there can be a place, from time to time, to sell.
I am sure that if up to 100,000 “followers” can be bought at a reasonably low price then a Twitter campaign could generate good returns on the investment.
E-mail was used in a similar way and I remember a claim in one magazine that as many as 10% of recipients became clients in its early days (mid 90s). I am not sure I believe that ever really happened unless it was one heck of an offer to a really well researched target group.
Gone are the days when e-mail was ever thought of so highly. Yet the humble telephone can be highly productive for sales and it is about interaction and conversation.
Yes buying “followers” will work for some, but it is going to become a jaded way to communicate if you only talk and don’t listen.
