I Ain’t No Followback Girl (or Boy)

Just the other day I saw the above tweet in my @replies column on Tweetdeck. I have to admit that right at first I was a little angry, offended and irritated. Not because this person chose to stop following me, but because they thought it was necessary to make a public statement about it. It felt a little bit like an attack on me and all because I had not automatically followed this person back after they followed me. Of course, in a matter of seconds my emotions came back to reality and I replied with an apology, explaining that I was weeks behind on going through people’s profiles to determine if I was going to follow them. I have explained my process in further detail in a previous post, but in a nutshell it goes like this: whenever I have time I go through the list of people who are following me and check out their profiles, looking at their bio, background, avatar and recent tweets. If it seems we have something in common, or they seem funny or engaging or interesting in some other way, then I will follow them back. But I don’t automatically follow people simply because they chose to follow me.

I ain’t no followback boy.

I don’t really even comprehend the expectation of the followback.

One of the things I have been learning through my own and others’ engagement in social media is that, for me, it is a good policy to incorporate into my online world most of the same ideologies and personal courtesies that inhabit my offline one. Politeness, respect, honesty and integrity are some common elements that I try to extend to my online and offline friends and contacts. Of course, I don’t always succeed (in either world). But I try.

When someone in either world decides they want to begin paying attention to what I have to say or share, I do not automatically begin giving them the same attention. After all, just because they consider me interesting doesn’t necessarily mean they are. It’s kind of like if I was having a conversation with some people and someone else started eavesdropping. I wouldn’t turn to them and say, “What do you think?” In fact, I might not even know they were listening. However, if they initiated contact and said something like, “Hey Brian, I like what you said. Here are my thoughts about it. What do you think?” then I would definitely interact and begin forming an opinion about this person. At this point communication has started and the potential for relationship on some level is unleashed. But until there is some type of interaction, how in the world would I even know anyone was interested or interesting?

The idea of automatic followbacks in social media is the birthplace of much of the gaming that goes on when people begin to try to amass numbers. There are people who have asked me to make them a friend on Facebook, but instead I have immediately hit the ignore button – either because I have no idea who that person is, or because I do. I am not interested in becoming your Facebook friend if your stream is going to bombard me with preaching, or sales pitches, or things I am uninterested in. The only reason I would automatically make people a friend is if I am trying to increase my numbers, which I am not.

Same thing on Twitter. I already try to pay attention to over 2,500 people’s tweets. I can’t possibly keep up and I’m sure I miss quite a bit of interesting, educational and insightful information as it flies through my Tweetdeck columns. So I am very careful about following additional people. I want to know their tweets add value, or are humorous, or they interact with others, or they have something in common with me. I definitely don’t want to add tweets to my stream that push a political, religious, or sales agenda. I don’t want to have to sift through the automated tweets that come out every few minutes telling me to visit this blog or whiten my teeth this way or join someone’s mafia mob or how to gain 400 followers a day or make $300 in minutes online.

This is my choice. It is the beautiful freedom of social media that I truly love. I can pay attention to who I want to when I want to and everyone else can do the same.

If you don’t like the channel, change it. Or turn it off.

If you don’t like what I am sharing, unfriend me or unfollow me or unsubscribe to my feed. That is your choice and I treasure your freedom to make it. If you value some things I share and are annoyed by others, then talk to me about it. I am not a people pleaser by any stretch, but I am always interested in learning and growing and becoming a better person and communicator. I have made adjustments to the way I do some things because people I barely knew have expressed suggestions, or problems they’ve had with how I was previously doing things. Even as opinionated and strong-willed as I am, I am completely open to change and constructive criticism. Don’t believe it? Try me.

Here’s another thought I had: if you follow me but then decide to unfollow me simply because I didn’t follow you back, why were you following me in the first place?

I believe in following people for a reason, many of which I have already shared. I never expect them to follow me simply because I followed them. It just doesn’t make sense to me.

I refrained from including the above person’s name because this is not an attack on them personally. In fact, I am grateful for the thoughts and this blog post that they inspired with their tweet. I imagine they had no ill will or even realized how their tweet impacted me, and unless they read this post they probably never will.

No, this is an attack on the expected followback mindset. It is my opinion that this is another social media malfunction that needs to find it’s rightful place in the trash so we can move on to creating real relationships and contacts and friends and interactions that matter and mean something, rather than playing the ridiculous numbers and popularity game. It is just my opinion, which means you are absolutely entitled to disagree. of course, if you do, I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below. If you agree, then please share your thoughts as well.

To quote Gwen Stefani’s song Hollaback Girl, the namesake for the title of this post, “This my sh**!” Because this Twitter stream or this Facebook profile is mine, I get to do me, my way. If you like it, you are welcome to join in and follow along. Let’s engage. Let’s connect. Let’s communicate.

And if you don’t like it, you are absolutely welcome to change the channel. I am sorry to see you go. But you can rest assured, I won’t be following you around begging you to come back and follow me.

Because I ain’t no followback boy.