Should You Buy Followers and Engagement?
We've all received a message asking if we want to buy followers or engagement on Instagram. It sounds like a quick win, but this article discusses how it damages organic growth and your paid advertising.
Do you often get DMs like the picture? Let’s talk buying followers and engagement and how it is damaging for organic growth and any form of paid social advertising.
Although it sounds like a quick win for rapid growth. The reality is, it'll not only effect your organic growth, but it will also damage the results of any form of paid advertising you do on your channel.
Why Buying Followers Damages Organic Growth
If your engagement isn’t proportionate to your growth, the Instagram algorithm will be reluctant to push your posts out, ultimately damaging the reach of your posts.
Instagram is constantly looking for the best content for its users. If you’ve suddenly jumped 1k followers and a very small proportion is engaging, Instagram reads that as your content not being good enough.
So it will effect the reach of all your posts.
Why Buying Followers And Engagement Damages The Results Of Paid Advertising
One of the warmest audiences you can advertise to (and by warm I mean those that are more likely to buy from you and therefore a cheaper cost to you as a business) is your Facebook & Instagram followers.
You've probably used it when putting budget behind a post or an advert on Facebook and Instagram in the past - e.g. "advertise to all Facebook page likes"
When you buy followers, they are literally dud accounts from across the globe. They will never engage or buy your product or service. They aren't vetted beforehand and tailored to your business.
Therefore, you'll literally just be chucking your ad spend down the drain. And will NEVER get a true understanding and be able to measure how effective your ads are.
And EVEN WORSE, if you run ads to lookalike audiences (people who look like your Facebook or Instagram following), you'll be throwing even more money down the drain as Facebook bases the information off the data provided.
So you'll be showing your ads to just more dud accounts - whereas Lookalike audiences are actually one of the best ways to attract new customers!
Basically, don’t take the shortcut.
What Should I Do Instead?
Instead...make honest connections and build your online community. Instagram will then be more inclined to push your content to even more of your target audience & potential customers, the more people engage with it.
Ultimately, trust the process! Pick up on best practices and enjoy the learning. There may be a few people/businesses that grow fast on the platform, and it CAN happen.
But don’t let that define your journey. Be consistent and listen to what the data is telling you (i.e. if people are engaging with certain types of content).
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