Hello guides, I’m a lever 5 guide but 1st time to connect. But anyways my problem is that I can’t get followers. Some of my reviews are very popular but I don’t have any followers at all. I’m a lever 5 local guide that is an extensive traveler to just give reviews from different states. But how do I get people to follow me
Hello @Paranormal1 ,
Welcome to Connect. I’m sure that some of the more experienced users will chime in shortly, bu just curious why you’re wanting followers. I’m actually pretty choosy as to who I’ll keep as followers. They need to be current and have something in common with what I’ve been doing from a submission point of view. I didn’t really start getting followers until I was at Level 7, and had posted from many areas around my country. I ‘remove’ followers who must be saying ‘yes’ to something Google is prompting them to do, since many are VERY new to Maps. why do I follow others? they’re either friends I’ve made, or align to what I’m doing. why are you seeking Followers, there’s no real benefit as with other sites or apps. - Steve
Hello @Paranormal1
Welcome to this wonderful community. This is like a home for Local Guides.
Request you to please go through the following articles. This will help you immensely.
While replying to a specific Local Guide (LG) or to mention a specific LG, please use ‘@’ followed by the respective LG user id. You will get this by typing ‘@’ slowly. e.g. mine is @Kumaarsantosh.
Now to your specific query ‘Can’t get followers’:
Firstly, I fully agree with what @shunsader mentioned ‘why are you seeking Followers, there’s no real benefit as with other sites or apps’ .
Secondly, the only thing which you can do is to contribute quality contents on the map. Keep sharing with the objective to help others. We all are doing the same out of our passion and to help the community. Rest other things will follow.
Wish you all the very best.
Keep building informed community stronger 
together.
Jai ho!!!
Before reading your response @shunsader I was going to ask: What is the benefit of having (many) followers? But now, vice versa, why do you remove any or what is the disadvantage of having too many followers or those overcrowding the list, who in reality are not interested at all?
Having said that, I can confirm seeing the number of followers increasing almost daily just started at level 8 or 9.
Hi @Paranormal1 , welcome to Connect and thanks for asking.
You have received some replies already about the opportunity of having followers, as your question is “I can’t” let’s go to see some different point of view.
From a technical point of view you can have followers. You already have one, and the “follow” button is available on your profile, as you can see from the screenshot here below
From a “social” points of view, why should I follow you?
You are introducing yourself as a business in your avatar and in the description of your profile, so why should I follow a business?
I follow people (real people) basically based on a few principles:
Honestly the two palms (one is blurred) in your profile are not inviting people to follow you.
Maybe if you provide great contents instead of a blurred photo, and introduce yourself as a person you can get more followers.
On a side note, introducing yourself as a business is against the Local Guides Program Terms and Conditions : “Organizations, brands, and businesses are not eligible for the Program.”
Please replace your avatar and description accordingly. Of course you can also leave the Local Guides program
Let me add one more aspect to this.
With more followers, we can get more likes on our photos and reviews.
All the best
Morten
I remove them for a couple reasons.
Hope that helps. - Steve
Thanks a lot for the explanation @shunsader ! “Affiliation” ist a got point, the other two reasons a certainly worth to think about.
“With more followers, we can get more likes on our photos and reviews.”
I guess I never thought about it this way. It would be nice to see statistical data to see if when removing the first 2 bullets of people in my response here,
whether there’d be any justification in keeping those that just aren’t active, and might still be following. - Steve
Hi @shunsader
I don’t have any statistics on this. But clearly I get more likes compared to before having followers. And likewise when I see a nice photo or review in my Following feed in Google Maps I often give a like to friends.
Maybe it is worth mentioning that I limit the list of people I follow to 100 and those are people I know somehow.
By doing so it is always interesting to browse my following feed in Google Maps.
Cheers
Morten
Well, everything is true, when we talk about followers, @MortenCopenhagen , @shunsader , @WilfriedB , @Kumaarsantosh , and I don’t think anyone of us is following any “likes” strategy.
And everything is wrong.
Back to the original question, it is interesting to see that @Paranormal1 wants to have followers, but he’s following only one person. So why he’s expecting others to do something different from what he does?
@ErmesT , @MortenCopenhagen , @shunsader , @WilfriedB , @Kumaarsantosh,
His real question was “But how do I get people to follow me”, which it appears that we may not have fully answered. Perhaps here’s some criteria that would make it more likely to ATTRACT followers:
Create better content, photos, etc, so people have a reason to follow you.
Be authentic and transparent. Your Connect name has nothing to do with your business name or profile. Perhaps make them the same, or clean it up a bit.
More of a GOOD THING is better. Thus, achieve higher levels and you’ll have more exposure to those that would want to follow you.
Follow others, and they might follow you.
Steve
@shunsader good point and one more (possible) fact, it seems to me,
