I have resigned myself to the fact that you can never get to everyone Chef, so what I have decided to do about this is to make sure that I upvote comments that have some substance to them and counter back with an equally weighty comment. On average, I would say that I have about 30 core followers who I communicate with on a very regular basis. I have found that this has actually allowed me to get to know people, even better. I don't worry about dead or ghost followers but what that means is that these statistics don't offer me very much in terms of giving me the ability to change my own strategy.
You are absolutely right my friend! I would love to have only 30 followers instead of the 1000's!
I am also quite same like you, engaging regularly with some 25-30 regular ones.