A very good equivalent of “following” (as in “the pop star has a cult following”) is zhui1 peng3. “He has a large following” can be rendered as “zhui1 peng3 ta1 de ren2 hen3 duo1”. It’s a perfect match in such a context… zhui1 and peng3. I suspect that this Chinese phrase was originally coined as a quasi-equivalent of the English word “following”. But this doesn’t apply to “mei2 ti3 de zhui1 peng3” – “media following”? Sounds awkward. “He is very popular with the media”… “he is the darling of the media”.