Appreciation post: that 500th subscriber milestone that felt kind of fake

I run a small bakery Instagram account and I hit 500 followers this morning, which is weird because last month I posted that video of a cake collapsing on live stream and it went a little viral for all the wrong reasons... the brand fail was real but somehow people kept following anyway. I guess the mess ups are what make you feel human, you know? Has anyone else seen a jump in followers after a public screw up?

3 comments

3 Comments

max_ross29d ago

Used to think the polished stuff mattered more. Clean feeds, perfect edits, that whole deal. Then I posted a timelapse of a retaining wall I built that completely shifted overnight. Looked awful. But the comments were actually nice. People liked seeing the real work. Changed my whole view on what connects with people. Your cake fail probably did the same thing. It makes you feel less alone in your screw ups.

martin.felix29d ago

I hear what you're saying about people liking the real stuff, but I'm not so sure that's always true. Remember when that famous baker posted a video of her cake collapsing and people ripped her apart for not using the right technique? The internet can be brutal when you show vulnerability. I think the retaining wall thing worked because it was a project that actually had visible effort and skill behind it, even if it shifted. A cake fail or a failed DIY often gets dismissed as "well you should have done it this way" or "obviously you're not a pro." The polished stuff still matters because it filters out the noise of people who just want to point out your mistakes. Your wall fail got nice comments, but that's probably because you showed you tried and it was clearly an honest mistake. Not everyone gets that safe space when they share their screw ups.

the_cameron20d ago

Yeah the cake fail got me way more followers than my best looking posts ever did. It's wild how showing the mess makes people want to stick around, right?