Dear Newbies: Please Stop Asking People to Follow You

Or if you must…

Photo by Charles: https://www.pexels.com/photo/portrait-photo-of-an-adult-black-pug-1851164/

I just had a notification on a comment I left. A writer (not the writer of the article) I am unfamiliar with responded in a (politely) contradictory way, and then asked me to follow them since they were only two away from 100 followers. All “Do us a solid” style.

Yo. My newbs. This is not the way.

This person had

a. never read me, or shown any good faith that they would read me OR

b. followed me

And they just expect me to follow them…why now?

I get that Medium has made it a little bit harder to monetize, but honestly, getting 100 followers if you take the time to read and comment here is not hard. I think it took me under two weeks.

I get new followers every day, most of whom have never read me. I have no idea what they expect me to do. Throw a parade? Read them? Again, why? I will follow a writer if I enjoy their work, or if the feeling is mutual, bonus.

But requests for a follow in my comments will get a follow from me precisely never, especially if you haven’t even bothered to leave a thoughtful comment (also a lot of the time no reads registered).