‘Unfollow’ has become a bit of a dirty word in blogging circles. I don’t think it’s always necessarily a bad thing though.
I think it’s okay to unfollow people, should their feeds not inspire or appeal to you anymore. Our tastes change over time and we have the right to hone our feeds how we want them to be, featuring topics that inspire and capture our interest. So often, we hold on to people for fear of being seen as rude or being publicly called out for it. But we need to stop fearing the ‘unfollow’ button. It’s rarely, if ever, personal.
The only time I disagree with it is when people unfollow in a strategic manner. You know the ones who follow and unfollow, often repeatedly, solely for their own numbers. It’s shady and it’s sneaky; not cool. They could have the prettiest feed ever, but that behaviour would completely switch me off from following them. I absolutely dislike it.
As we do our best to fight the unfair algorithms, it’s disheartening when our numbers waver so often. It’s frustrating, especially when you’re doing your damnedest to grow your following or are close to a milestone. But think about it – wouldn’t you rather have loyal, engaged followers than fickle ones? This is something I remind myself of every time my numbers drop a little.
I personally don’t think it’s feasible to follow thousands upon thousands of people. I just don’t see how it would be possible to keep up with such a high number, especially on the likes of Twitter or elsewhere, whose naughty algorithm only shows me a fraction of those I currently follow anyway!
Social media platforms of all kinds are a very busy place at the best of times. Unless I’m on there 24×7, 365-days-of-the-year, I don’t think the feed would cater to such large numbers very well and I’d end up missing a lot. And that defeats the purpose – when I follow someone, I want to be kept up to date.