Why You Should Care About Instagram Automation and Bots

Social media automation has been normalising cheating for years now. This may sound like a bold statement. Let me explain.

I regularly report Instagram accounts that are using bots to like, comment, follow and watch.

Sometimes I reach out to these account’s holders to ask them why they chose to use bots, also known as automation, and sometime I let them know I reported them. This helps me discern between “bad” and confused people. Most people ignore, some apologise and others attack. All of these reactions make sense to me.

The ever changing nature of social media is forcing many people to employ unethical and ineffective tactics.

The social media platforms’ changes maybe the reason why social media isn’t producing the results you are after or maybe there are any other reasons, I think that more often than not social media isn’t bringing any fruits due to the lack of directions – many entrepreneurs have no social media strategy. And with that and bad marketers’ advice, many reserve to automation.

Let me explain why social media bots and automation aren’t serving you (or them!) and why I think it’s important to address this problem. Even if you are not using Instagram for your business, it’s affecting your life. Let me explain how.

Before deciding on how I felt about bots, or automation, I myself invested in testing out the tool.

Automation bots are a third party software (created by people outside of social media) that allows your account to find other accounts (of your choice) and follow/unfollow, comment on, like their content and watch Instagram Stories… on steroid, something like a thousand of engagement points a day or an hour. I used automation for several months myself to try and understand why so many people told me I should use it.

The idea behind this practice is that the accounts you are “engaging” with will come back to follow your account, satisfying many people’s desire to grow their social media following. Over time your account looks big (with many likes and comments throughout). For many, big account means they can trust you, buy from you and be impressed with you. Without getting too metaphysical, your Instagram following size doesn’t mean you have satisfactory (or any!) sales. There are accounts with huge following and no engagemnt or income.

There are concerning 3 problems with using automation:

1. The growing following isn’t genuinely! They are not really interested in what you do. Many of the new followers you gain as a result of automation are bots or other accounts who are using automation, meaning they don’t care about what you do and eventually unfollow your account. It also means that they are not your target market; therefore you won’t make income, you won’t create impact and you are even further away from someone who actually needs your support.
2. While following and engagements are fake, the affect this has on the Instagram technology is real – this is skewing their algorithm. Unless found out, automated accounts receive some preference in the system due to their higher engagement and may appear in the people’s news feeds hiding the accounts you care about instead. Tricking system doesn’t work in your favour. This is hindering many honest and impactful people’s work and training our minds to accept cheating. This is how it becomes okay; and no change takes place. Bad practices prevail and no one benfits from it.
3. Bad practices made mainstream hurt our entire society. Individual reactions aside (see the image below), many accounts I reported tell me they didn’t know what was the issue with using automation since they were just “promoting their business”. We are becoming more accustomed to bad behvaiour allowing it to continue. Many of us also feel discouraged to do anything or use Instagram, restricting our opportunities. This is a huge disservice not only to individuals, social media channels but the entire society.

I believe that better education can help improve our business and marketing practices creating real results. There will always be “bad” and confused people. And you have a choice of how you want to live your life.

I think we must continue having these conversations and reach out to bots’ users challenging their thinking and asking more questions.

If you are unsure about how you feel about automation or want to learn more, just reach out – I’d be happy to chat.

P.S. Whenever you are ready… here how I can help you leverage social media technology to really power your mission:

I design simple and effective social media and Facebook ads strategies helping gifted not for profits and businesses for purpose leverage their social media technology and loyal community to really power their mission, building more donations and creating impact. My work is custom solution aiming at the specific needs of your work.

There are many ways you can reach out to see if I am a good fit for your goals. Check out the Facebook Messanger bubble on the bottom right, contact page on the top and/or a form and a calendar, if this type of communication suits you better.

I look forward to supporting your vision of the future!