Downloader: Twitter followers are worthless, or worth a lot less than you might think

Monday, February 1, 2010

Twitter followers are worthless, or worth a lot less than you might think

How do you determine what something is worth? Generally speaking, the answer is that something is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it. This comes up when trying to evaluate the value of companies, but it can also come up when trying to evaluate the value of something that is conceptually new. For example, years ago companies popped up that created an economy around the hyperlink. Today some people are trying commoditize Twitter followers.

As Techcrunch points out, a year ago Jason Calacanis offered $250,000 to Twitter to include him on their suggested user list, which at the time would likely have netted him about a million followers. That offer placed the value of a Twitter follower at about 25 cents.

Today, you can purchase Twitter followers on eBay Buy-It-Now listings for less than half a cent. That puts Jason's valuation last year at 50 times the current value.

Of course, the problem is that just like hyperlinks, no two twitter followers have the same value. The followers you can get from eBay listings are likely either automated bots, or followers created by follower farms driven by cheap laborers in China. And Jason's desire to acquire followers from the suggested user list would have resulted in similar low-value followers.

Of course what makes a Twitter follower valuable is engagement. If you have something to say, then you want your followers to actually be listening. On the other hand, if you just want to seem impressive with a big number of followers beside your name, I guess it's not that expensive to do these days.