Why You Shouldn’t Fall For “Follow/Unfollow” Instagram Sham
It won’t help you earn money on Instagram
Many so-called Instagram experts will tell you to use the “Follow/Unfollow” strategy to gain followers. Stop wasting your time.
In fact, if you look for tips to grow the number of followers, the “follow/unfollow” strategy will dominate most of the articles online. Well, in reality, if your brand is using this technique, I’d suggest stopping. If you’re not using it, don’t bother to start.
In short, the “follow/unfollow” strategy is when a user follows another account and unfollows it a couple of days later. It’s a way to get attention because Instagram will prompt notification about a new follower. The follower expects the user to follow them back, thus grow the number of followers.
In reality, this strategy can help you grow the number of followers. However, those followers will not be the ones engaging with your content. No surprise, Instagram has put a tremendous emphasis on engagement and not the number of followers.
It is just driving me mad sometimes when I get random followers who I know will unfollow me in a couple of days because we literally have nothing in common. It screams very loud to me — BAD MARKETING and BAD ATTITUDE.
Even if you manage to get hundreds of thousands of followers, your engagement rate will be ridiculously low, which will flag your account to other prospective customers or followers and Instagram itself.
Moreover, Instagrammers are very smart nowadays, and it’s pretty easy to spot accounts that predominantly use the “follow/unfollow” strategy. There are many tools, nowadays, to check on accounts engagement rate and evaluate the quality of followers:
- Tanke Instagram Engagement Calculator shows you the engagement rate of any account you search,
- Hypeauditor also helps to analyze the followers.
The “Follow/Unfollow” strategy is a waste of time and resources. I would rather recommend using strategies that in fact work and will bring you high-quality followers.
The follow/unfollow strategy can, in fact, harm your brand, as you may be perceived as an annoying account trying to gain users through spam. Being disinterested in others’ content and following them just for the sake of them following you back is definitely spammy. It can seriously damage your authenticity.
I frequently encounter other annoyed users who publicly shame such accounts. The last thing you want is to appear on someone’s story or post with a negative comment.
Instead of wasting your time with follow/unfollow strategy, I suggest you using the genuine means to grow the audience that will engage with your content. I invite you to join my FREE Instagram Marketing Bootcamp and learn how to grow your account — all in 5 days via e-mail! Easy! I will share my best secrets that many so-called Instagram gurus don’t talk about.
