The following is a list of reasons of why you should not be subscribed to my blog, why you should not be friends with me on Facebook, why you should not like my page, why you should not be connected with me on LinkedIn and why you should not be following me on Twitter or Instagram.
1. You don’t like the work I’m doing.
2. You don’t like the message I’m communicating.
3. You don’t like the direction I’m going.
If any of those three apply – feel free to unsubscribe, unfollow, unfriend and/or unlike and you will not be judged nor held in any negative light by me.
HOWEVER… if you do like the work I’m doing, if you do enjoy the message I’m communicating and you do like the direction I’m going… then welcome aboard! I’m excited and honored to have you join me on this journey and to see where we can go from here.
I recently had someone want to swap a “social media shout out” in exchange for a free photo shoot with me claiming that the promotion they could give me would far exceed the time and investment it would be to photograph them. I declined.
I declined for the same reason that I will never hire a consultant to grow an over-inflated Twitter following of people who care nothing about me or what I’m doing (or who may or may not be real human beings). I declined for the same reason that I do not have a pop up window on my website forcing you to subscribe to my blog before you can do anything else. I declined for the same reason that I do not swap “shout outs” on Instagram with accounts designed for that sole purpose.
Of course we want to grow our following of those who and tuned into what we are doing. I am no different in that desire. But what I do not want is a horde of people who are connected to me for the wrong reasons or who simply don’t enjoy being connected with me but are because I gave them a shoutout. I want people who are in the genre and field of what I am doing and who care about why I am doing it.
It does not gives me any business benefit nor personal gratification to have a few hundred thousand fake accounts connected to me in inflate my social media numbers so then I can go around and attempt to convince people of my importance (despite the fact they’ve never heard of me).
I am proud to have the permission and attention of the people who have been kind enough to be subscribed to my blog, to like my page and to follow me. That is something I plan to respect and honor.
Thank you for that opportunity.
James Patrick
