Recently, I have read countless blog posts and tweets about Twitter followings.  I’ve read about how to get followers, how to lose followers, how to get 10 000 followers overnight, and the debate on whether I should or not.  I have read  so many references to Twitter following, that I can’t remember where I read anything.

Who is with me on it doesn’t matter!?  Twitter is not a numbers game.  It is not a popularity contest for which the number of followers is what matters.  Followers are not the currency of Twitter.  10 000 passive recipients of a tweet is not productive or meaningful.  Quality over quantity.

The currency of Twitter is RT – 2 letters.  Retweeting, not your following, is what gets your message out to people.  An RT gets your message out to people who don’t follow you and, thus, leverages other peoples’ networks.  If you tweet value, people will share your message (some might say that value is the currency of Twitter, but value is subjective, so I’m sticking to RT).

“But, Sarah, you need followers to get RTd!”  That is true (well, not always,  but I’ll run with it).  How many followers you have is not as important as what kind of followers you have.  If you have 10 000 followers who couldn’t care less, what good does that do you? I could tweet some keywords and get some bots to follow me to raise my following.  Good for me.  Not only does that not get me anywhere, it does nothing for my legitimacy or authenticity.

Now, I know this isn’t a new concept. Tweeps know the value of RT.   So with that said, let’s stop obsessing about following and focus on what really helps get the word out (whatever the word may be – Perez is currently one of choice.  Like I said, value is subjective).