A news tweet is written and sent out into Twitter cyberspace. That one tweet receives 200 retweets, 150 favorites and gains them 10 more followers. This is a normal day for Atlanta entrepreneurs Jeremy Jones—a former Georgia State student—and business partner Joshua Jelks as they work on their Twitter account “Everything Georgia (@GAFollowers).”
When the idea for GA Followers was born three years ago, Jones and Jelks never imagined their following would spiral like it currently has. Today, their Twitter account has over 126,500 followers and counting.
“I always have this dream of having it like Channel 2 Action News,” Jones explained. “We make news to tailor to our generation. We just want to make it relatable.”
Jelks agreed that relating to their audience is key.
“Now we understand what our crowd is receptive to. We know our crowd right now,” Jelks said.
GA Followers is built for a younger audience as they tweet about news, Atlanta events, features, funny quotes, inspirational quotes, people and much more. They try
to make every tweet interesting and relatable.
Originally, the team designed GA Followers solely for music content. It all started when Jones came up with the idea in Washington, D.C. He made a shout out page called DMV followers and it was instantly a hit. He then realized how much of an audience there was for something like this in Georgia and immediately told Jelks.
Once they began tweeting shout outs to followers, a different demographic appeared.
Instead of having just music, Jones and Jelks started tweeting about news. Today, a number of followers look to the GA Followers page for daily news reports in Georgia.
“It kind of created a snowball effect and we understood that we had a different responsibility for our Twitter account,” Jelks said.
The main idea was to find their audience. If they tweeted something and they did not get a good response to it, they would delete the tweet and start again.
This is not the first time the founders of GA Followers have worked together. They started working together at Kroger and have known each other for a total of 13 years.
“I wouldn’t want to work with anybody else with something like this besides him,” Jelks said.
They balance each other out. Jones is known for reaching the stars and dreaming big, while Jelks thinks more realistically.
GA Followers has its own writers, photographers and videographers who work on day-to-day operations for the GA Followers website, Instagram account and Facebook page.
One of the main things their employees get is a good following on Twitter. Readers can see the writer of each article and then follow them on Twitter for more updates. @GAFollowers will also either tweet about the reader retweet them.
“It almost makes them feel like they are celebrities,” Jones said of the effect this outreach has on their followers.
Because of their large following, Jones and Jelks have been offered several unique opportunities they might not have received before creating GA Followers. For example, Jones was flown out to Los Angeles to tweet at a concert featuring Kendrick Lamar, Rick Ross and Big Sean.
GA Followers has also gained sponsors such as Footaction, a shoe and clothing company. Each month Footaction provides clothes for the team. The clothes are then given out to followers who can either answer a quick question or be the first one to retweet it. They also give out tickets to games and other events.
But operating and maintaining a large following on Twitter is a full-time job for both Jones and Jelks.
“I’m tired of the spotlight,” Jelks laughed.
Jones used to be a marketing student at Georgia State, but because of costs he decided to take a semester off and focus his energy on GA Followers. Jelks has a background in electrical work, but he too made the decision to focus on the company.
“We talked about it and were like, ‘We need to be fully in it if we are going to do this,’” Jelks said.
In five years, they hope to see GA Followers continue to grow. And they have the formula to get them there.
“You’ve got to know your voice on Twitter. You have to make it interactive –– know what your people like. It has to be a two-way street.”
