It’s the nature of the game.
Some people will try to prop up their accounts by misrepresenting their reach – and by extension – their influence.
They purchase followers and likes from black market sites so they can appeal to brands for affiliate marketing purposes. Others simply do it for superficial reasons.
These fake followers are typically bots that add no value to the platform. Worse yet, they take away from the user experience that we all love.
And do you know what?
Spambots can’t really “like” your brand. They can’t give real insight that can impact your business. And they can’t spend real money.
Here are a few strategies that you can use to audit individual profiles to spot the fakes:
Determine the overall purpose of your Instagram account
This is fundamental.
If you’re on Instagram purely for the social aspect, you can jump over to the next step.
But if you’re interested in tying your efforts to a business or marketing goal, you need to determine what the overall purpose of your account is.
Considering that more than 50% of Instagram users follow their favorite brands, you may want to tap into that and set some marketing goals.
The point of this goal mapping exercise is to:
- Make yourself accountable to a specific outcome. This way, you can measure your results, track your progress, and determine your ROI.
- Improve the effectiveness of all the steps that you take moving forward. Your content strategy and everything else you do will be dependent on the goals that you’re working towards.
What does a goal look like on Instagram? It can be any number of the many uses that the platform provides.
The more specific, the better.
The more measurable, the better.
Here are some examples:
- Increase your brand storytelling efforts
- Improve audience engagement
- Generate a consistent affiliate marketing income
- Increase your product sales
- Drive more traffic to your website
- Convert more people to your email list
- Connect with influencers in your niche
- Show off your company culture so you can attract superstar team members
- Build buzz and momentum for an upcoming product launch
You can make these more concrete by attaching specific numbers to them.
For example, “start generating 5K/month in affiliate marketing income by the 31st of December.”
While specificity is important, your goals don’t have to be set in stone.
They can evolve as your business grows. They can take a complete turn if your vision changes. They can increase or decrease in scope.
You are the architect of this plan.
