Inauthentic Engagement Update By Instagram
If you’ve noticed your engagement rate dropping, you’re not alone. In fact, there are millions of Instagram users sitting right along with you. One of the biggest problems we’ve seen in the last few months is heavy follower loss in addition to less engagement.
There are few things going on and some of them may actually be your fault.
The new algorithm and update from November 19th to reduce inauthentic activity on Instagram may have you scratching your head. You can read all about it here but we’ll sum it up for you.
Instagram can detect automated activity, they’ve always been able to. Now they are doing something about it. Automated activity is the use of a bot or program that generates engagement on a users behalf, including following and unfollowing. It may not be detectable to anyone else, but it is to Instagram.
Anyone with their profile connected to one of these programs may have their accounts disabled. You may not be using these programs yourself, but if your followers are it will impact you. Millions of users are connected with these programs and they are highly at risk of being temporarily or permanently disabled. Because of this, you will see your following drop dramatically as those accounts are no longer on Instagram. In case that wasn’t clear, these aren’t fake profiles. They are regular people, using popular programs.
More importantly. you may be one of these people and not even know but let’s start with some facts and get the record straight.
“Bots” are activated by a computer program, they can’t produce activity on their own, they aren’t real people. Users can purchase bot services to automate activity or create completely fake profiles to appear “real” by activating automated activity. Additionally, you typically have to provide your password or authorize programs to generate this activity. A common misconception is that someone can activate a bot on your account behind your back. There is a difference. Someone can absolutely send fake profiles to follow you that are generating automated activity to appear “real” with bot activity.
If you feel like that doesn’t apply to you, there might be something else. Quite a few influencers will use programs to follow, unfollow or block unwanted accounts. We get it, you don’t want ghost accounts following you because this hurts your demographic. This is a bot. Even though you are using this program for good use and you are not generating inauthentic traffic or accounts, it is STILL A BOT. When a program follows / unfollows / or blocks accounts they work on an algorithm, which is automated. Authentic activity happens sporadically, automated activity works rhythmically. Instagram can 100% tell the difference between the two and they will punish you for it.
Not to beat a dead horse, but Instagram can detect inauthentic activity. Did you know comment pods fall under that category? If they can tell whether a user is engaging with a sophisticated program, they can sure as hell tell if you’re in a comment pod. They might be real people, but the comments are completely inauthentic. This is actually the easiest thing to detect, you don’t need an algorithm to notice it. This is detrimental to your engagement. Don’t believe us? We have a program that will show us your rating and if your comments are from a pod. You can get your report below.
You may not get kicked off of Instagram for your behavior. However, you can bet your engagement will suffer if you are partaking in any automated services, even if they are not generating what you might consider inauthentic engagement.
BE VERY CAREFUL how you operate your account, Instagram has done a lot to change the dynamic towards rewarding users that have purely authentic activity