How I Gained 1k And How You Can Too

I set out this year with several goals for girlgonedreamer, one of which was to reach 3k followers on my most used social media platform - Twitter. It took me the best part of one year to build it to the 2k mark, so another 1k over a twelve month period seemed attainable.

Apparently I did something right as here I am - beginning of February - and I've already reached my end of year target. January wasn't the easiest of months but by golly it feels so worth it now. I'm going to share my tactics in the hope that you'll be able to apply them and see results for yourselves.

Of course numbers aren't the bee all and end all, but for myself there is an importance there and perhaps you feel the same way too. Sometimes people are afraid to admit that they want the numbers but that shouldn't be the case. My goal when starting out was always to build an author platform and until I have reached a certain level of online success I'll be holding back with my book.

As most of you have probably found, not all tactics work for everyone and a lot of it is just pure trial and error. The trick is to try a few different things and eventually you'll find one that works for you.

One thing I am not interested in is buying followers. Sure it's an easy way to get yourself huge numbers but who seriously wants hoards of bot accounts that can't even interact? It certainly isn't going to prove my worth to any publishing houses. I'm not here to judge though, each to their own.

So to the all important question. How did I do it?

Scheduling

Firstly I started scheduling tweets. I know some people will groan at this because they prefer 'real time' or spontaneous tweets but hek I work full time. I can't tweet throughout the day cos I'd get the sack. Hootsuite was recommended to me by a blogger friend and after using it for a couple of months, I now realise what a difference scheduling makes. More and more people are leaving messages or interacting with me. I'm getting countless more retweets too. I log on in my lunch break daily and now have three times as many notifications as before. Yes I do still tweet for fun spontaneously in the evenings and weekends but scheduling for me is the way forward. It has worked wonders for my situation.

Sharing the love

I share other 'must read' posts and tag the blogger in question, utilising relevant hashtags and attaching any 'Tag for a retweet' Twitter accounts. This was kind of a fluke I suppose. I didn't set out to just share in order to grow my following. I genuinely love reading other decent posts but it also hasn't done me any harm.

Blogging more frequently 

As you will be aware, I've started blogging on a more regular basis. Creating what I consider 'worthy' content three times a week is damn hard work and takes its toll when I'm also holding down a full time job. But I absolutely love blogging and I've worked really hard on creating better content for you all.

Being part of the community 

I try to leave comments on other blogs even if I only take half an hour out of my Sunday evenings to do this. I especially like to respond to those who have commented on my own as they have taken the time to do so. I am always on the lookout for new blogs to follow too.

Competitions

I usually run a competition once a month. My best advice is to choose your prize carefully. If you know your audience or your target audience, aim for something they'd like. I deliberately went for the Zoella travel set for my January prize because I knew my followers would love it and I hoped other like minded individuals would jump on board too. Obviously this did involve parting with a bit of my hard earned cash but as I got it in the Boots Christmas sale it was actually quite the bargain.

One thing I'd like is to take part in more Twitter chats but with working late and my busy schedule it's not viable at the moment.

And that's it really. It's been a mixture of all the above that has made the difference. Like they say, the proof is in the pudding. My hard work is slowly paying off. Instagram and Facebook are a whole other story. I think lots of people struggle growing these platforms especially with the new Instagram Algorithm so they'll be on my 'to work at' list later this year. For now it's just about my blog and Twitter.

Talking of which, you can follow (if you don't already) by visiting me here.


Do you have any tips to share? Please share them in the comments below.



Justine xxx





Image via Pexels (Sorry if the Facebook image confused anyone but I just loved the use of the Scrabble letters and there wasn't one for Twitter.)