In the past few years, social media platforms have become a massive part of our lives. All of them, be it Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and so on, have grown exceptionally well. So much so that these platforms are now capable enough to turn content into a monetary game, wherein content creators can make a living for themselves.
From influencers to brands and everything in between, social media platforms are used by all, and everyone wants to be at the top of their game.

And for doing so, creators need a large audience and high level of engagement. This can be achieved in many ways, and one of them is by becoming a part of a social media pod. Now, what are social media pods, and how effective are they? Well, we are here to address all these questions one by one. Let’s get started!

First of all, what are social media pods?

In the simplest terms, social media pods are groups that include a number of creators who come together to engage with each other’s content, promote it, and increase its reach. In this way, many creators collectively rise up by sharing each other’s content. For example, person A has posted a piece of content on their social media platform, then person B, C, and D would engage with it by liking, commenting, and sharing it.

In this way, the audience of the other three individuals in the pod also comes to know about person A’s content, and his/her audience broadens. This brings us to the next question.

How many members can a social media pod have?

Technically, a social media pod can have as many members as you wish to have. However, experts have their suggestions regarding the number of members. It is often advised to keep the pod close and tight such that it does not have more than 100 creators.

Having too many people will not only make the management and communication more complex, but it may also cause bots to recognize you and take action. We will talk more in detail about when and why bots take action later in this write-up. First, let’s know and understand the reasons behind people considering joining social media pods in the first place.

What makes people join social media pods?

So many people create and join social media pods every day, so there much be some solid reasons behind doing so. So, here they are.

Greater engagement

This is the biggest reason behind joining social media pods. There are many people on whom you can depend on keeping up with the engagement rate, as the members of a pod are meant for the sole reason of interacting with the content and sharing it as much as possible. This engagement greatly helps the creators, as it causes the algorithm to recognize and push their content.

Broadens the audience

When several members of a pod share your content on their profiles, newer people come to know about your social media presence and get an idea about your content and niche. This causes them to visit your page, and if your content truly interests them, they end up following you. The point is that becoming a member of a social media pod fetches you, new followers, without having to do anything out of the way.

These are two of the biggest reasons behind people joining pods. However, is it actually safe to do so? Can you get in trouble for being caught for this? Let’s find out.

Are there any risks involved in joining social media pods?

Ideally, yes. There are certain risk factors that you need to be aware of before you take any action. Here are two of the most significant risks involved:

Violation of community guidelines

As you may know, all social media platforms have their community guidelines, which state the dos and don’t for the content creators and consumers of that platform. Now, most of them do not encourage pod groups as social media platforms greatly value authenticity and honesty when it gets to receiving engagement and reward.

And to ensure that this is maintained and that no creator makes use of fallacious or crooked ways of deriving high engagement rates, these platforms employ bots that can identify such acts.

The inability to leave pod groups

This is something that many creators have faced and struggled with. As mentioned many times before, pod groups help in boosting engagement and helps your profile grow. However, when you start depending on pod group members to share your content and engage with it, you get used to it. This makes it difficult to leave the pod group at any point because doing so may lead to a significant drop in the level of engagement. This may hamper your reputation, stall your growth, and even cause the social media bots to catch you.

Now that we have all the benefits and risks considered, we’re fit to rationalize all the thoughts and come to a conclusion.

Conclusion – Is joining social media pods worth it?

To be fair, social media pods can work well as long as the engagement derived from them doesn’t make up for a significant portion of the total engagement. Meaning, you can create pod groups with your friends or fellow creators that are genuinely interested in your content instead of depending on random strangers that will blindly try to push your content.

In this way, you won’t be caught violating the community guidelines and won’t have to worry about losing your growth even if you leave the pod group.

So, to sum it up, yes, social media pods can prove helpful, as long as you know how to stay out of trouble by managing the risk factors and finding acceptable loopholes.