Should You Buy Your Way to Social Media Fame? [Video]

It used to be that folks looking to improve their social network relied on works such as Dale Carnegie’s immortal tome How to Win Friends and Influence People. In the 21st century, however, good old-fashioned glad-handing is running a distant second compared to the Internet. For those searching for a shortcut to fame and fortune, new friends aren’t made—they’re bought.

While purchasing friendship (or at least influence and power) is hardly a novel idea, the extent to which some seekers of Internet popularity go to gathering a multitude of new friends and followers is certainly unprecedented. Celebs and other public figures rack up huge numbers on social media, thanks in large part to phantom friends.

But laying down the lucre to create the impression of popularity can backfire in a big way. Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney learned this the hard way in 2012, when a jump of nearly 120,000 Twitter followers in a single day lead to suspicion and ridicule in the media. Then again, depending on the metric and the existing visibility of your profile (say, for example, whether or not you’re a candidate for the highest office in the United States of America), it’s also very possible that buying followers could turn out to have almost no impact on your social media sway.

Public opinion on fake followers is a mixed bag. The general consensus seems to be that buying fake followers can be a useful tool—but only if it’s not obvious they’re fake. Big numbers can help entice real folks to follow you thanks to something known as the Bandwagon Effect, and companies who use their fake followers as leverage to attract genuine ones may gain actual influence.

On the other side of the equation, brands and individuals more concerned with authenticity than quick gains often review their followers carefully, using analytic tools to help weed out phonies and keep their tribes “legit.”

So should you buy your way to social media fame? As with any marketing effort, the answer will vary with your brand and your social media goals. Garnering a large number of followers can help your reputation in your market, but those gains can quickly be outstripped by the damage that comes with having your fake follower empire exposed.

No matter what you choose to do, remember that landing real followers—and their purchasing power and influence—is the ultimate goal.