"Followers"-The Worst Metric of The Internet
Followers don't count. If you ever wanted to build an online presence, read this.
Do you know what’s the worst metric of the internet? Followers (aka subscribers).
Seriously. Think of any big YouTuber you’re subscribed to. Check his/her live stream. What percentage of their subscribers connect?
50%? 30%? 10%? 1%? (less?)
And I’m not only talking about YouTube subscribers but any platform where an audience follows a content creator. Instagram, Twitter, and even Medium’s followers don’t matter that match.
Wait what?
This isn’t related to one platform in particular, but to how the internet works.
Before we dive into why this happens. Here’s another example,
I’m subscribed to a YouTube channel with 200k subscribers. It uploads great content weekly, but its last 6 videos average 20k views.
Why does that happen?
Many reasons.
People lose interest over time
YouTube won’t (always) send notifications to subscribers
The algorithm
No one can control reason #1, but it’s possible to control reason #2 and rely less on the algorithm.
Most content creators already know this. Unfortunately, they use social media to deal with problems #2 and #3, but the thing is, social media followers don’t count too. This happens because platforms such as Twitter/Instagram still have an algorithm to show you what they want (ads, trends, and popular tweets/photos).
Every tweet or Instagram post you publish competes with other people’s tweets and posts (let alone ads!).
The only type of followers that matter nowadays are email subscribers
Emails have become a modern asset. It’s a simple, yet effective way to get to people’s inboxes without relying on any algorithm.
The email inbox is one of those few online places where you don’t compete with a big crowd but only share a space with a person’s contacts.
No wonder why some YouTubers and Medium writers pay a monthly subscription on expensive email marketing platforms to collect emails from their audience and contact them regularly.
I pay more than $100 every month on Converkit to keep my fast-growing email base. That’s an investment that; fortunately, pays off every single month.
I’ve experienced great growth on Medium since I started sending weekly newsletters. Also, it’s easier to sell my courses through email (you can even automate a sequence of emails with Converkit).
If platforms like Medium or YouTube die tomorrow, I’d still have a bunch of emails that will help me start off on the right foot on any other platform.
Not every influencer out there can say that.
The number of followers has become more like a “reputation” than a useful metric
I know what you might be thinking—subscribers/followers show the reputation of the content creator and that helps them get sponsors, collaborations, etc.
That is true, but you don’t need a big number of followers to get sponsors, and even channels with a small niche can get more sponsors and earn more than channels with a big audience. This happens because some audiences are more valuable than others.
For example, one of my channels barely has 2k subscribers (and hasn’t even joined the YouTube partner program), yet I’ve got 2 sponsors who paid me well for a 5-15 min video.
Of course, I have the “unfair advantage” that I got to know those sponsors thanks to the articles I write.
I doubt you might have this unfair advantage, so I’ll show you a place where someone with 100 followers can get as many views as someone with 100k followers (no more unfair advantages!)
On Medium, you can get as many views as me (even if you have 0 followers)
Tbere’s one platform where your followers have very little impact—Medium.
I have almost 10k followers, but that doesn’t matter on Medium. On that platform, anyone can get as many views as me even from day 1!
Why?
Medium has something called publications. They’re like big YouTube channels where anyone can submit their pieces and (luckily) get access to their big audience.
To put it simply, you might have 0 followers, but if your article is accepted by a good publication, the article would reach every person who follows the publication (through email, social media, and Medium itself).
Here are some of the big publications on Medium.
Towards Data Science - 500k+ followers
Better Programming - 200k+ followers
As you can see, data science and programming are very popular topics on Medium.
You see? I’m not that special. I’m just using the right tools to grow on the internet (modest aside, I’m making good decisions too, but that’s another topic)
Say you write a data science article, and it gets published on Towards Data Science. This means that your article might reach 500k readers even if you have 0 followers!
Of course, relying on a Medium publication, in the long run, would be as bad as relying on the YouTube algorithm, but at least it’s a good start. In the beginning, you can use publications to collect emails and, after some time, you can become more independent.
Submitting an article to a publication is one of the rules of thumb that you should follow if you ever want to write on Medium and build your online presence.
I talk more about how to make money using your programming and data science skills on Medium on my course. Feel free to ask me any questions here or by email.