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Who Has the Most Fake Twitter Followers?

May 28, 2013 By Carol Stephen 24 Comments

Ghost Followers

If you pay attention to numbers, then you might be interested in knowing about those with the most followers on Twitter. The top three at the moment are @justinbieber, @ladygaga, and @katyperry. Justin Bieber tops the charts with 39,548,681 followers, Lady Gaga has about 37,000,000 followers, and Katy Perry trails with 35,000,000. So if you’re a newbie on Twitter, you might be thinking that even getting 100 followers could be a massive understaking.

Note: before I go any farther, I’m not singling these celebrities out. Buying followers has become common practice, but it’s good to be informed.

A Long, Long Road

Let’s see…who do I know on Twitter, you’re thinking to yourself…uhh…your cousin, maybe? Oh, and your friend from the gym and those people you met in that networking group that one time (that’s 6 right there!). So getting to 40 million–how is that even possible?

Invisible Friends

Does Justin Bieber Have Invisible Friends?

Would you feel better if you realized that many large accounts have invisible friends? That’s right, and they had to buy them, too! It’s not like when you were a kid and you had friends who talked to you who then disappeared back into the wallpaper. These are fake accounts bought and paid for by these Twitter “superstars.”

It’s Not Really a Lie

If all three of these big celebrities are not telling the truth about their followers, what else might they be exaggerating? When Justin Bieber asks if you want to be his boyfriend cause he’ll “take you places you ain’t never been before,” should you belieb him or would you end up eating cold burritos on the side of the road? And did Katy Perry really kiss a girl or did they just shake hands? When asked about her fake followers, Lady Gaga just kept a poker face. Don’t worry: I’ll stop soon.

Ways to Check Follower Counts

Sites like Gizmodo, Status Bakers, and Status People’s Fake Follower Check have pointed out that for these celebrities and many others, somewhere from 47-50% of followers are fake.

Recently there have been a few articles on sites like Mashable about people buying fake followers. In fact, recently I’ve noticed many more accounts following me who offer followers for sale. Many accounts who offer fake followers do not have many followers themselves. They don’t care much about speling or “punkshuation,” either! You can check fake followers by using Fake Follower Check. Just login using your Twitter account if you want to know whether your favorite celebrity has fake followers.

Feeling Insecure?

If you’re having self-esteem issues because you don’t yet have 40 million or even one million followers, just remember: it’s not how many followers you have, it’s how you use them. And if you truly want to connect, then follow me. I won’t pay you, but I love you anyway.

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Fake, Followers, Justin Bieber, JustinBieber, Katy Perry, KatyPerry, Lady Gaga, LadyGaga, Numbers, Twitter

Twitter By The Numbers

May 14, 2013 By Carol Stephen 18 Comments

Numbers Matter in Twitter

Maybe you weren’t good with numbers in school. Maybe numbers were boring to you and now you’re happier letting someone else deal with the “math” of your life. There are just a few numbers that you might want to consider when you delve into Twitter a little deeper. You could use some of these numbers to help you track your progress on Twitter.

Ratio of Followers to Following

Twitter by the Numbers

Like your cholesterol’s HDL versus LDL ratio, it’s important to shoot for a “good ratio.” On Twitter, that means roughly one follower to one following. Celebrities or superstars may have a huge number of followers and follow very few people. Some people won’t follow those with low numbers of followers (something to keep in mind if you’re going to run out and follow 2,000 accounts when only 17 people follow you). Decide if you want to follow a million people without many of them following you back. What do you get out of following all those celebrities, anyway? You could cut them loose and just put them on a list. For me, the most important thing when deciding to follow is good content and conversation.

Number of Tweets

You might want to look at an account’s number of tweets to decide if they would be a good fit. I am fairly chatty (which is prolific) on Twitter, so someone with only a few tweets may not be the best fit for me. If the account has only 23 followers, I will probably dominate their Twitstream, since I tweet 20+ times a day and that’s on a slow day. However, some newbies find that they really like the chatty nature of Twitter. But if you’re not going to have conversations on Twitter, you might not want to follow people with huge numbers of tweets. First check how many tweets a user averages before following them if too many tweets is a concern to you.

Number of Listings

The number of times you’ve been listed by others is a good indication of Twitter success in my book. So although this isn’t your usual key performance indicator, it’s one that is more important than followers, especially since followers can be bought. Being listed is a real badge of honor because it means that someone took the time to create a list and then put you on it. Take a look at my friend, @TerriNakamura’s listings, for example. She has been listed over 3,500 times. To me, that’s a real sign of success on Twitter.

Total Number of Followers

The total number of followers isn’t the most important number to many social media experts. Partly that has to do with how easy it is to plunk down some cash and buy followers. There are ways to tell if someone bought Twitter followers. And if you think big accounts are all truthful, Gizmodo has a great article about celebrities and their fake followers. In fact, selling followers on Twitter has become a huge business lately.

Which Numbers Impress You?

Are you impressed by large numbers of followers? Why or why not?

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Followers, Following, Listings, Numbers, Ratio, Twitter

4 Clues Twitter Followers Are Purchased

August 9, 2012 By Carol Stephen 32 Comments

So I’ve noticed lately a lot of people with extremely huge numbers on Twitter. By huge numbers, we’re talking about tens of thousands. If we were in a grocery store, and these people were in the produce aisle, they would not be organic. Ok, maybe that metaphor isn’t really going to work. What I mean is, they have no relationship with those tens of thousands of followers. Among my friends who are social media managers (SMMs), we say those people “bought” their followers — they literally plunked down some cash so they could get a thousand or ten thousand followers.

How can you tell if someone bought their followers? Here’s what I’ve noticed.

1. Don’t have lists & not on anyone else’s.

If you’ve been on Twitter awhile, you use lists as shortcuts, a way to organize so you can cluster followers together. For example, your list called “locals” might have people in the same city as you, and so on. So, for someone to have, say…10,000 followers and not be listed anywhere? Suspicious.

2. No engagement.

Unless you’re a celebrity superstar or news channel, you need to have some conversations going to get big numbers. If you read a few tweets in the other person’s timeline, and there’s no engagement, and they’re not a celebrity, how did their numbers get so big? Also suspicious.

3. Huge number of followers, very few tweets.

Building a big following organically (read: not paying for them) takes time. It doesn’t happen overnight. So 10,000 followers and 200 tweets? Very, very suspicious.

4. Twitter start date is too recent.

If the account is only two weeks old, how could they possibly have 25,000 followers? Even a caffeine addict who never sleeps couldn’t add that many followers in two weeks. Extremely suspicious. Especially if their avatar is the Twitter egg.

We all know that having big numbers makes people look popular on Twitter. And sometimes being popular can impress others. But: so what? Who are they trying to impress with those 100,000 followers who have no real relationship with them?

If you’ve come across someone with huge numbers, would you follow them based on their number of followers? Please leave a comment below! Thanks!

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Fake, Followers, Purchased, Twitter