How Fake Followers Are Killing Brands

We all know why we WANT followers, but the ethical ways to gain those followers are becoming blurred. Having a heap of followers can make you and your brand look boss AF.  Here is the one reason why you and your brand could consider buying followers: having tens of thousands of them makes you or your brand look like a boss.
It goes like this: the more followers you have, the more people trust you brand and perceive you as a 'tastemaker' in your field.  

Social media mimics our high-school days. Most people choose to play with the popular kid when given the choice. A large social following gives you what the marketing industry terms 'social proof'. Which basically means, proof that people like your stuff. Unlike school, it’s super easy to buy fake followers. Just Google “buy followers” and you’ll be met with an endless supply of people wanting to sell you their numbers. Around $10 for 1000 followers. 

The truth is buying followers can seriously harm your brand’s image.

Here are 4 reasons not to hit the buy button:

1. It seriously messes with Instagram's new algorithm. 

Instagram's algorithm decides if your photo deserves to be seen by your fans within the few minutes of posting. The engagement on your post in this time is vital. Though here is the clincher - it is also based on the engagement in relation to your following. If only a small percentage of your 20k following engages with your image in the first few moments, Instagram will throw that post to the bottom of the pile, and your engagement will dwindle within hours. 

2. People who know what they’re doing, can spot your fake followers from a mile away. 

All it takes is someone to take a quick glance on your account and see that you have 100,000 followers, terrible content and 100 likes per photo. Mostly, fake followers have 0-6 photos about the same amount of followers or are private accounts with none of the above.

3. These followers are not your customers.

This doesn’t need any explanation. Fake followers are not your customers nor are they ever going to be.

4. Lack of engagement

It doesn’t matter how many likes or followers you have if there’s nobody engaging with you. Purchased fans don’t engage because they’re not real people.  
Be patient. Build your authority one day at a time and remember the main social media rule. You want people to trust you.

So Don’t. Just don’t. 

What you SHOULD do is create great customer engagement. Engage in conversations with your customers, spread the word about your brand, gather customers’ feedback. Build customer loyalty and trust. And then, when people know you and know that they can trust you, they might buy your products!

5 Things To Consider When Choosing Your Next Influencer

Social media is a valuable tool for reaching customers, but most brands have a limited reach. While content development is first, once a business is set up on social, growing an audience is generally next on the to-do list. To truly boost its bottom line, businesses must find ways to regularly reach new customers.

Just ask an influencer and they’ll tell you how utilising their influence is quickly becoming the biggest opportunity to do just this. An influencer is an online personality with a large or devoted group of followers and because of this, influencers have the ability to get a message out to many people at once.

Brands often make the mistake of looking for influencers with the biggest following, but in a crowded marketplace where buying a following, or acquiring a following and not keeping them engaged is common. Here are a few things to ask yourself when choosing an influencer for your next campaign.

1. Do they love me?

Influencers will generally work with brands for two main reasons. They either love company A’s product or service, or company B is giving them a great big pay cheque. You always want to be company A.  Find individuals who share your brand values and can communicate with your target market.

2. Are their followers compatible?

Unfortunately, in this game, numbers are meaning less and less each day. Yes, the more followers someone has, the more engagement they may generate. However, even if an influencer has 1 million followers, their audience may not be interested in your brand. The girl with 100,000 followers but only posts pictures of her boobs and bum probably isn’t the right person to be promoting your cafe. Identify influencers whose audience (yes, their audience and not necessarily the influencer themselves) matches your own target market.  
 

3. Are they authentic?

Perhaps a funny question to ask when you’re talking about scheduled, generally inauthentic content. However, before selecting an influencer have a little look at their posts to determine if the content posted regularly is a good fit for your brand. I once saw a health food blogger, who spoke about her organic and vegan lifestyle, feature a sponsored post about Nandos. What!? This is NOT an authentic fit. So, browse through past posts to make sure you won’t have any surprises after your partnership launches.

4. Do they engage with their audience?

When executed well, social media conversation encourages two-way communication. A good influencer for your brand will not only post beautiful or interesting content, but will also interact with their fans. The regular engagement means followers are more likely to pay attention to recommendations and in turn end up on your social account and website.
 

5. Are you measuring your results?

Once you’ve identified the influencers you want to work with and the work has begun, make sure you measure your results. Take a look at a variety of analytics tools like Google Analytics, Squarelovin or Iconosquare. Find the one that best fits your marketing efforts and measures your marketing goals. Over time, you’ll be able to clearly define your successes to shape future campaigns.

Influencer outreach really does work best when the influencer matches the brand, is in tune with the message, has control of the format, loves the product and has a great relationship with their fans. Put all of that together and you’re sure to get a head start on growing your community. 

Instagram Galleries - The Big Change

Instagram moves closer and closer to its big brother Facebook every month. Next step? Instagram Image Galleries.

According to multiple news sources, a new feature is coming to Instagram. Members of the Instagram Android Beta Program, have revealed that the latest beta version of Instagram will let users enable multi-photo selection (up to 10 photos per single post).

This feature will be similar to the Facebook Canvas Ad - where you can scroll through multiple images on a sponsored Instagram and Facebook post. At present, only advertisers have access to this functionality; however, it appears that shortly this will be open to all users.

This move is an interesting one. On one hand, this potentially saves us from endlessly scrolling past friends we morally can’t unfollow, but that can’t help but share every single photo they take, regardless of quality. On the other hand, this potentially dilutes the success of campaigns meaning lower engagement and higher cost of advertising.

Instagram is yet to comment on when or if this feature, will be available to the general public. However, as it’s already being tested in the latest beta, we imagine it can’t be too far off.