I don't mind when youtubers ask people to follow cause I always forget to, because I don't offer content there and I forget that it's even a thing.  Steemit is different cause we are all content creators really.  

I'm not a fan of pop culture mentality that encourages popular things to become more popular, I believe there are always lots of deserving people who are struggling to be heard and seen and want to support them, but that pop culture mind-set is really why people care about followers.  More followers means more followers (in steem SP and rep are also indicators that people use to figure out what's "cool" if they can't figure out for themselves), which means more payout or a wider reach.

I hit 2000 yesterday and I don't really feel a significant increase in comments and engagement from when I had 500 followers, just the nature of the platform I guess, oversaturated feeds and inactive accounts and all.  **My sudden increased payout is all due to being put on a trail, nothing else really.**  

At steemit it's obvious because SP is responsible for how much a vote is worth, but even on platforms where 1 person=1 vote, one **follower can be worth 1000 others and not because they are "bigger" or more important**.  I got put on the trail because I was particularly good to a particular steemian who also happened to love my writing and nominated me for the trail.  She didn't have any significant power or influence and a week earlier she was also getting peanuts on her posts.  But she remembered me and wanted me to succeed and she made it happen for me. 

So just doing what you do is actually a better strategy for success than trying everything under the sun to get to the top, and valuing every connection is sometimes smarter than any investment strategy.

I could have turned this into a post, I think I will.