The garden of Social Media
Communication and interaction has expedited, paving way to tremendous changes in the last 15-20 years. Aiding easy access and providing wings to extending connections across the globe, social media has dynamically left a profound influence on contemporary society. If social media is a garden with a multitude of flower species, then the trending instagram is the rose corner, attracting bees with its bewitching charm and fragrance.
With a hijacking elegance, at times it even pricks hard. If instagram is a rose garden, then an influencer is the most mesmerizing, distinct rose. What gives them the alluring charm to woo the bees? It’s the ‘followers’ who add an extra color and fragrance that enables them to stand out of the crowd. Hence, this allusion provides a lucid image regarding the role of buying followers in instagram. Don’t you think, be it a big rose or a small one, a rose is after all a rose.
This particular article deals with:
- The trend of buying fake followers.
- Highlights the role of business promotion through the medium of Instagram.
- Provides a psychological approach to the act of buying fake followers.
- Explains the effects of such forgeries.
- Provides few tips to the alternative source of receiving more followers through proper channel.
- Elucidates on social responsibility.
What acts as a fuel for people to get fake followers by buying them randomly?
Perhaps a human mind tends to follow the crowd blindly, ‘the crowd effect’. The more the number of followers, the more your brain compels your fingertip to touch the follow icon. And a large number of followers enables a large amount of flow of dopamine and oxytocin in the bodies of the account holder.
Is this tendency only for the release of happy hormones? As depicted earlier, with beautiful petals, rose even has pricking thorns.
When countless notifications promote the secretion of happy hormones, the juxtaposition of the number of likes and comments reduce the level of serotonin as well which could prick a person’s mental health really hard. However, for an increased attention or to reach the celeb stand or striving to influence the laity and to get into the limelight, one prefers increasing the count of followers and tries every means to get the desired number. The hike in the role of influence of instagram has made it important to get a good graph of followers indeed.
A combination of Business and Instagram, Is it a harness or a harm?
Due to its stipulation, Instagram has turned into one of the best mediums for business promotions, brand endorsements, social support, a public cause, so on and so forth. To reach out to the community, the branding companies look out for people getting good attention and the followers list eventually aids their work. There are various ways to increase one’s followers’ graph scale. If done in an authentic way it requires great efforts and diligence. Nothing is as easy as a cake walk, if done with honesty.
Thus, one has to be regular and committed in order to get the desired outcome. Routine posting of creative ideas, rich content, entertaining posts, encouraging remarks etc. in the right means could earn a person popularity within the span of patient waiting. Such popularities are therefore hard earned and equitable.
On the contrary, there are some who wish to count the chickens before they hatch. And to attain a promotion level, some people tend to gain it by hook or by crook. If not by actual sense, then they raise capital to attract bees and make their garden full with flooding followers. Two categories of people usually do such business of buying ready followers.
One, who are already favored by the public but wish to exaggerate their importance to self promote their value. They remain in a whimsical mood to attain an exact number like 1M or 10M, no more, no less. Second category involves a list of aspiring bloggers, who in delusion wish to become influencers, a readymade hero from zero. A recent search gave the price of buying instagram followers, which ranged as follows:
- 100 followers = Rs 150/-
- 500 followers = Rs 575/-
- 1000 followers = Rs 875/-
- 5000 followers = Rs 4000/-
And the list goes on and on.
Such offers do guarantee the suggested number of followers, but they certainly do not assure the same amount of contribution to the number of likes and reasonable comments. It is virtually impossible to keep a track on the fake profiles. The mismatch in algorithms could however be detrimental.
A Psychological Outlook
Beyond the social, limelight vibes, at times it could be looked upon as a process of validation. A bullied past, mentally ruining childhood or anything for that matter could be a reason that instilled a fear of self love in their minds.
Thus, the number of followers or likes gained on their posts, make them determine the value of love or makes them acceptable to themselves. Appearances matter only when you make them a matter. And don’t you think 100 true, hard earned followers are better than the millions of fake followers!
With money one could buy followers, but can one get real, true comments for their posts or creativity? Isn’t the fake appreciation akin to the artificial make-up used by the ladies to look more appealing? Don’t you think a natural look determines the real beauty of a female, than the application of layers of fake make-up? If that’s true, then few real followers are far better than the purchased fake followers.
When you post something on social media, either it’s to highlight the importance or the beauty or an idea; its highly appreciable to receive quality based comments which would help you to grow rather than the fake comments bought by hard money. In order to quench the thirst of followers, does one realize the worth of it?
Effects of such forgeries
Along with the fast growing competition throughout the dimension, fake accounts too flourish massively. Top- notch contents or rich brands deliberately require a grand space to be launched or released. Hence, the companies select such influencers who could meet their need of reaching the multitude. In order to remain free from traps of fake profiles which usually pop out in case of those who buy followers, various companies restrain the process by evaluating the engagement rate along with the number of followers.
And this step turns out to be a game-changer. The engagement rate is the average percentile count of the sum of number of likes received and the comments acquired to the average count of the followers.
Once found accused of such malpractices, it would automatically result in giving black tag to both the account holder and the reputation of the company that extended a paid promotion. Once tricked, the influencer would no longer be trustworthy for any sponsorship programmes or brand endorsements.
Alternative techniques to get hold of real followers
Anything that comes of tough grind and candor, gives more gratification than any other. Here are few ways to attract the bees through just means:
Keep updating your profile
Novelty is the need of the hour. Try to alter your bio, description, profile picture etc. frequently in order to retain the interest of your followers and to provide something new each time they visit your profile.
Be regular
Punctuality and consistency could impress the followers. Whatever theme, genre or picture you post, keep posting creative ones regularly to keep them in contact.
Add alternative handles to direct traffic
Keep yourselves updated in other platforms as well like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn. Active users of each platform differ. Hence, this may boost your connection circle.
Indulge yourselves in direct conversations
Interacting with your followers directly either going live on instagram or through DM’s would accentuate your demand among the followers which would thereby favor your self-promotion.
Establishing friendly relations with other influencers
Doing collaboration with other influencers would help you earn more mutual followers; at the same time such friendly relations would definitely upgrade and enhance your profile.
These steps however require a great amount of dedication, perseverance and fortitude. Those who lack that patience indulge themselves in malpractices and upgrade their followers list in no time.
Social responsibility of influencers
Once you are well accepted, sought after and have the followers list extending up to many slides, a sense of pride might arise from within. That sense of pride and privilege must pave way even to the reasonable sense of social responsibility. The public however admires the trending, prominent figures. An ad of Dhoni or Kohli with a mask would definitely encourage the cricket lovers to follow them.
An ad of actresses like Deepika Padukone, Alia Bhatt promoting natural skin care products will definitely fuel the need for the natural products among the female strata. Therefore, such influencers can strike the iron when it is hot by channelizing their endeavors in an optimistic path.
The influencers must feel equally responsible to verify and re-check the received information before sharing as their single post could lure millions of followers and in no time the fake facts or news could become profoundly rooted in the minds of the society that in itself could lead to another pandemic, as false information is far more abhorrent than ignorance.
Therefore, if used with responsibility, liability and obligation, the role of social media and influencers could give a novel direction to the flow of optimism and hope in the society.
