How Not to Get Twitter Followers: Our Top Tips

Over the past few weeks, I've quietly researched what works and what doesn't when you're trying to get more people to follow you on Twitter. There are some surefire ways to add followers--promote your Twitter stream to friends, colleagues, or family; say something that's retweeted by thousands of Twitter users; have notoriety; or have your username crop up on sites like CNET that Twitter users frequent.

But for all those successes, I've found many more ways to utterly fail at adding Twitter followers. From begging to stories to gimmicks, there are a variety of ways to make yourself look foolish on Twitter without getting one more person to follow you.

Asking: Laugh, then ignore

Will you please be my follower on Twitter? My username is "DonReisinger" and hey, I'll even throw in a link!

Didn't work, did it?

Last week, I tested this out a few times on my followers by asking them to tell all their followers to follow me, and all I got back was a few snide remarks from followers saying things like, "Nice try, Don" or "Um, no." Unperturbed, I decided to try again later in the day, since I figured a different group of Twitter followers were using the service now and I might have better luck.

Nope.

Asking for Twitter followers is a major faux pas in the world of micro-blogging. First off, most of your followers will probably laugh at your willingness to show how desperate you are for more. Secondly, all your Twitter followers simply don't see that kind of request to their own followers so you can reap all the rewards. What do they get out of their tweet? You guessed it: nothing.

Fake stories: Anger and betrayal

Realizing that asking my followers for help wasn't going to work, I next tried telling them that I had entered into a bet with a close friend to see who would reach a certain follower count quicker. But to make it believable, I had to create an elaborate trail of logic: "A close friend and I have $50 on who can reach 2,500 followers first. Whoever does so, wins the cash. Will you help a friend out and find me some followers?"

Unfortunately, my followers had a few unhappy thoughts to share with me and my obvious ploy to add more. Suffice it to say that family friendliness wasn't a concern in their replies. (full Story)