Follower count: An accurate measurement of nothing

​A friend sent me a sample report that a service provides for bands. Primarily it shows the artist's total number of followers on each platform and whether their numbers are up or down compared to three days ago, seven days ago, and 28 days ago. There was a time when I would have loved to receive a report like this. Hell, years ago I manually recorded this data about my clients. But now I see it as pointless.

For one thing, so many people have artificially inflated their numbers with fake followers. There is one band with 1.5 million followers on Facebook. Anything they post kind of gets ignored. So either most of their followers are fake or the majority of their fans followed them AND blocked them. Either way, not good.

But even for those artists who have not purchased fake followers, that total means nothing. It is no indication of what your ticket sales will be. Again, there are bands with millions of followers on social media who could not sell out a minivan, let alone an amphitheater. 

It is no indication of how many people will: 
• Buy your album 
• Tell their friends about you
• Buy your merchandise
• Really listen to your songs and not just have them on as background noise

Follower count: An accurate measurement of nothing.