Level 1: Friends, family, and crypto-bots as followers. You’re trying to build a following of fellow writers who are themselves trying to build a following of fellow writers. If you succeed, maybe your short stories will start getting published. Nobody reads you. I am currently here.
Level 2: You’ve accumulated enough writer followers that an agent takes a chance on your novel, or your story is accepted in a shinier publication. Other writers pretend to read you.
Level 3: Your book is published. Your work may be read by other writers, or at least it’s skimmed. You don’t know if you’ve escaped the writers-reading-writers space and you’re not sure how to check. The majority of the large accounts we all aspire to be friends with are on Level 3.
Level 4: You have found the mythical readers who aren’t fellow writers. Much like the afterlife, nobody can prove this level exists because writers who ascend do not care to return to our mortal realm.