why I’ve removed 100K followers

My relationship with Instagram started off as a wild, passionate, overnight affair. I woke up one morning in March 2017 and announced to my family that I was now going to model as well as sing. They looked at me like I was insane, yet within a month I had 10K followers, and in two months I was signed with Bicoastal Management and landed my first agency-paid gig. When I started I honestly didn’t even know what an influencer was, and didn’t recognize the difference between having a large following, being a content creator and/or cultivating a community (all three are different and they may or may not overlap). Six months after starting I hit 100K. Pretty soon the sponsorships were rolling in and I was working with brands. I learned about this industry as I went, step by step, making endless mistakes along the way (mistakes that I will share on this blog for anyone who wants to build their own tribe). By April 2018 with 191K followers, I had a MAJOR question rolling around in my head that kept me up at night…

But before I tell you what that question was:

How did this rapid growth happen?

I remember at the beginning of my journey plenty of plus size models were criticizing women who were rapidly growing, insinuating that those of us who did were buying followers. And to be fair, many people do buy followers (and it’s pretty obvious to spot). But believe it or not, I was actually so naive about Instagram that I didn’t know one could buy followers until the snowball had started and I was months in. My first post randomly got 2.8K likes from the beginning, ranking on the Explore page and thus, I began with momentum and simply rode that wave.

I am guilty of some minor “instacrimes” for the sake of science however. I did pay– er, waste– $10 for a shady Russian shoutout page to repost my pics and I participated in desperate engagement pods. Neither did anything for my engagement, which was actually a robust 4% until the new algorithm changes took effect in late 2017. At one point I had 12K pairs of eyes on every story and my photos were getting on average 7-12K likes and hundreds of comments.

My theory is that I hit some kind of algorithmic viral jackpot; a fluke of sorts and one that is much more challenging to experience today. Being a photographer for a decade also helped as my photos were mostly high-quality, full frame images and Instagram adores quality content. (PS: Don’t you love how we talk about Instagram like it’s an actual person with preferences and feelings??) I was also posting content that was heavily body-focused, subtly sexy, and let’s not de-politicize this: I’m a white-presenting, conventionally attractive woman with an “acceptably curvy body.” Beyond that, I was also probably spending 8 hours a day engaging, commenting, posting, researching and strategizing. The effort was real, and it worked.

But, in all this chaos and growth I forgot to ask an extremely important question:

Who are these followers?

So finally I began to peel back the curtain and take a good look at the real Oz, and there couldn’t be a more appropriate metaphor for what Instagram is like. So many of the pages you see are really like the Wizard of Oz. Big numbers, little impact, no conversion.

In my case, my followers were 90% men, and many from foreign countries. It was sobering to see the reality once I stepped back to consider it. The men poured in fast because not shockingly it’s easy on a visual platform to get people to follow you by the sole virtue of “she’s hot.” Most of these men didn’t care about opera or my singing. They didn’t care about fat activism, anti-dieting, or any of the lifestyle subjects I discussed. And while this afforded me a foot in the door to work with a lot of amazing brands, I also dealt with constant derogatory messages, comments, fetishizing and very little actual meaning pulsing through the veneer of a large following. Despite all my talent, content creation skill, and value I felt like a sham. 

And I’m not going to lie, it’s uncomfortable admitting this openly, but I’ve never been someone to flinch away from truth. And I share this ultimately in an effort to inspire fellow models, singers, and content creators to help change this field and make it more impactful.

The truth was that my comment section was noisy and vapid, drowning out the important messages from the actual women I care about and I realized that I didn’t just want engagement, but quality engagement that was built on substance and solidarity. Maybe the numbers would be less exciting, but I realized that if I was engaging with my tribe around things I care about: music, food, style, wellness, fat activism, then even ONE comment would be so much more meaningful than 200 comprised of mostly of emojis and “hot bebe.”

I also started to listen to some really inspiring Influencer podcasts detailing the importance of knowing who “your follower” is and speaking to them, because in the words of Instagram guru Julie Solomon, if you speak to everyone you are talking to no one.”

The other problem with having off-brand followers is that it skews your data and strategy for content creation. At one point the photos that were performing best and getting the most reach were (shocker) the ones that emphasized my hips and curves. So, if I continued to create that kind of content in the desperate search for higher numbers, it would continue to spiral me in that direction. Not to mention that statistically only 6% of your followers typically are shown your content, so you can imagine how few of your target audience will actually see your work if 90% of that audience are off-brand.

So I did a dead halt. I re-strategized. I spent time visualizing and thinking about what matters, and I began culling followers with new, long-term goals in mind, returning back to my “why.” 

All of this is not to say that there is anything wrong about going down the “sexy insta model route,” and indeed what matters is that you live out your truth and do what feels right for you and your brand. There is certainly a way to leverage that and indeed I just launched a second account (@curvyelle) for that specific purpose, as I love sharing boudoir, pinup and modeling work immensely, but I recognize it’s a totally different genre.

The aftermath + my advice

If you too decide to remove off-brand followers and spammy looking accounts, know that you will have a dip (or spiraling crash) in engagement.

My page is way quieter now but I have begun doing more of what I genuinely love, which is creating more lifestyle content to serve my audience. And even though some of that content performs poorly in numbers, it’s honestly more meaningful.

For example my most recent pancake photo garnered a mere 160 likes, but a follower recently sent me a pic of them making my recipe for their family. Like what?! That means more to me than any number. Remember when you’re discouraged that it takes awhile for rebranding efforts to make sense. Think big picture and longterm!

Creating content that helps people and provides service to your community is what it’s all about, and if you find yourself getting wrapped up in the numbers, you’re letting your ego inform your journey.

Culling my following was the best move I ever did, as it helped me realize that what I ultimately want to do is connect and serve, developing real relationships with my tribe.

And the hard reality is, that takes time.