Amazon.com Widgets
---

Are You Following Me? · 1 May 2021


Supposedly, you can turn social media friends and followers into blog or vlog followers. I wish I knew how.


When I read the title of this blog post, I think of some paranoid person on the street furtively looking over his or her shoulder to see if that person in the trench coat is still there. Following at a distance. Following with a menacing look. Or I think of a person turning to face purported follower to ask, “Are you following me?” Either of those might be blog posts that others would write, but all I have to say on those topics is contained in this one paragraph. (At least for now.)


So how do people use social media to get blog or vlog followers? I do not know. I asked you first. Actually, I obviously do not care that much. After all, I have been blogging for quite a lot of years and have not leveraged my few facebook and twitter followers into regular readers. Or at least I do not think so. My readers tend to be a closed lip lot. They rarely post feedback, good or bad. So I do not know now many readers (either real or imaginary) I really have. (I guess the question is really about real readers since I am wondering about how many I REALLY have. Imagine that.)


At any rate.


When it comes right down to it, I have not spent enough time investigating how to turn readers into followers or subscribers. One thing that I have refused to do on my YouTube channel though is to ask people to subscribe. Oh sure, I did so for a time, but I decided it was obnoxious and unnecessary. After all, people know how to subscribe if they have been using YouTube for more than a few minutes. Besides, everybody else tells everybody watching their videos to subscribe, so why should I do the same? It seems pointless and unnecessary. And redundant. (I may have already said one or more of those things.) So I no longer ask people to subscribe.


The other thing I refuse to do is keep promoting myself. I know I am just trying to become MediocreMan. I know that the bar is high. After all, one of my friends keeps telling me so. But as much as my family might think that I am blowing smoke with the next statement, I really do not like to puff myself up. Really. After all, I know that when I do puff myself up, people who know me well, will just take all the wind out of my sails. Which is as it should be. After all, nobody likes a braggart.



Which is the crux of the matter of promotion. I cannot really brag on myself. At least not seriously. I can say I am great, but only tongue in cheek. Only when kidding. I really am just MediocreMan. Or trying to be that good. So can I truly promote myself? I do not know. After all, does anybody really wants to follow a mediocre man?


I suppose that I will never be a great self-promoter. After all, whenever I do brag on myself, I know I am kidding. After all, I really am just trying to live up to my self-given moniker. Which is probably why I do not spend any time trying to promote myself to get more readers and followers and subscribers. As much as I want people to read and watch my stuff, I cannot tell them to do so.


When it comes right down to it, I really do not wish I knew how to get more followers. I just write and post, and hope people read. I just make a video and post, and hope people watch. And I am happy when they follow or subscribe.


By the way, there is one benefit to not really trying to get more readers and watchers. I will never sound paranoid, because I will not ask, “Are you following me?”

© 2021 Michael T. Miyoshi

Share on facebook
---

Comment

Commenting is closed for this article.