If you have a blog you have a Twitter account.
Earlier this month I crossed over thirty thousand Twitter followers. I’ve learned quite a bit about Twitter, having followers, and what it all means for me. And even though I shamefully bought my first few thousand friends, I earned every subsequent one fair and square. Twitter has become my main source of blog traffic according to my analytics.
But that’s not the best part of having 30k tweeps.
I’ve carefully watched my follower count rise over the past year and I have now passed the critical point where…
I can get validation on anything I goddamn well type.
We all need validation. Inside of the most confident person is that one loose strand of their identity that, when pulled, causes insecurity to pour forth. For me often it’s my crazy ideas. I want to share them but I’m afraid of being seen as batshit crazy.
Once you hit thirty thousand Twitter followers there will be somebody who is on board with your nuttiness. You’ll tweet something like, “Thinking of wheeling Grandpa into traffic today!” and two people will reply with, “Dude, I totally almost did that with my Grandfather today, too!” And, voila! The thought about killing Gampops is no longer shameful.
Nothing sucks more than being alone. With 30k followers you are never alone.
Tweet about the fart you made during sex last week. Seventeen people will reply with, “Happens to me every Thursday!” Talk about the time you stole something really obscure from Walgreens like a pack of giant chewy Sweet Tarts. Even if nobody else has ever stolen that, a few of your followers will tweet back with, “Those are the BEST – normal size rots!”
For some reason this doesn’t work at 20k or 25k followers. You need 30k. The other nice thing is that most of the time you won’t even recognize the people responding. It will seem like you have new friends each time you get a reply. You’ll find yourself saying, “69JohnnyLips also thinks pastels go best with linen khakis. I’m doing this!”
Now, nothing in life that’s ever worthwhile is easy. Getting to a point where you are validated every time you tweet something isn’t a quick jog around the condo. It’s a marathon of putting in a minimum of an hour a day of building the base of followers. You have to get involved and make it so people feel like they have to follow you. This is a lot of work.
But the payoff is great. Feeling alone on a Sunday morning and eating boiled asparagus and kettle corn will never again seem weird. Someone out there will reply, “OMG – that sounds AMAZING!!!!!!” It’s easy to think of yourself as a weirdo when you don’t have anyone to tell you that you’re great. You need those people.
Take a photo of your cat. No matter what the cat is doing/not doing you will receive at least four, “What a cute kitten. She’s a good girl!”
By the way, since you love hearing about my cat-pee stories, today when I got home I made my way to the restroom to move some earth. I have one of those stand up shower stall things with a drain in the middle. Weird that it’s considered fancy but just has a hole in the floor. Anyway, while I was doing how I do, the cat walks into the shower squats and pees, all while looking at me. I saw it trickle down into the drain. She has now peed in both bath stalls in the past few days. Amazing.
Here’s the other benefit with having thirty thousand followers. I get one-two tweets/direct messages a day telling me how funny I am. These are unsolicited. The best kind of validation. I heard when you get to 50k you get three a day. Nothing better than sitting at work daydreaming of the semi-attractive chick in accounts payable and up pops a, “Your tweets make me smile – and I just wanted to say thanks, mofo!”
So, hop to it. Network like crazy and build that fan base. Stop going to your family and friends for validation. They’re sick of supporting you. Anonymous people online are where it’s at. They’re just waiting to tell you how great you are. But you must find them. Go find them and raise your esteem. It’s worth it.
