It doesn’t cost a lot to buy Instagram followers. The sham accounts we bought averaged just north of $15 USD for ~1,000.
Does buying Instagram followers work?
Yes, technically. Surprising no one, it turns out you can still buy fake Instagram followers in 2021. For a small sum, your phone will be flooded with notifications, and your favourite vanity metric will go up accordingly.
But if we ask a slightly different question—does buying Instagram followers work to make your account successful?—then the answer is no. Fake followers are bad for your analytics and your credibility.
3 reasons NOT to buy Instagram followers
1. Instagram can tell, and may suspend your account
Creating a fake account is explicitly forbidden by Instagram’s Terms of Use, so bot or ghost accounts are regularly purged. If you’ve bought followers, you may get a warning, you may have your account temporarily disabled, you may lose the followers you paid for, and—worst case scenario—Instagram might just suspend your account entirely.
2. Brands can tell, and won’t want to work with you
There are plenty of easy tools that will show any dirty secrets to potential brand partners. As a growing influencer, the absolute worst thing you can do for your career is buy followers.
In fact, rather than buying them, most influencers are trying to get rid of their fake followers, in order to increase their engagement rates and improve their attractiveness to potential brands.
3. Real people can tell, and they will cringe
A profile that has fake followers is obvious to anyone who uses Instagram regularly.
A high follower count with no engagement to back it up is just, well, desperate. That means that any potential followers—real people who will actually engage with your posts—will notice, and be turned off.
For instance, the last time we bought followers (for science!!) the only comments we got were randoms stopping by to roast us!
What to do instead of buying Instagram followers
If you want to grow your Instagram audience, there are plenty of ways to find real human beings who will actually connect with your message, and engage with your content, and perhaps even buy your product.
