Purchase Social Media Engagement?
The purchase of followers and engagement has become Big Business. Followers, mentions, comments, retweets, and ‘the like’ became opportune digital commodities some years ago and have thrived since, particularly in Asia and the United States of America. With that said, in Russia you could head to MacDonald’s and pick up 100-10,000 retweets en route from a vending machine.
The so-called Like Factories offering such services are so efficient that said purchase would - in some cases - be present on your account before you could consume a Big Mac.
What does that tell us… Our increasingly interconnected world places significant priority on - what we might call - ‘social value’.
Consider the following proof… In the modelling industry you are identified as the next big thing and invited for a test shoot. You photograph well and impress throughout the post-shoot interview, essentially securing a place at the agency! Sadly, however, you fall short of required ‘social status’ and are denied a contract. Did you know that many western agencies openly state a requirement of [at least] 15,000 followers on Instagram before you can be associated with them? Shocking, but understandably so from a marketing perspective.
Fundamentally, 'If one does not bring social value then they are by default valueless'.
Most marketing professionals will advise against purchasing following/engagement, or 'growth hacking', and in general it is an absolute no-go area for a number of well researched and self-evident reasons, such as:
Instagram's Community Guidelines, "Help us stay spam-free by not artificially collecting likes, followers, or shares, posting repetitive comments or content, or repeatedly contacting people for commercial purposes without their consent".
Before contemplating any such move it is important to understand that by permitting third party services to access your social accounts you may lose access for a period if not permanently, and also risk your chance at verification etc.
With assistance from ever-advancing technologies social media platforms carefully monitor our 'behaviour' and utilize the data produced for research, development, and marketing purposes By monitoring and measuring how we use accounts, the types of content we engage, how we grow our audience, and what we like, digital communities are mapped by behaviour, which is problematic when we flag for being in violation of terms like the above.
QUESTION - In terms of securing an inorganic following... 'Does it depend on the objectives and current social status of the person/organisation/project, or just don't do it?'
Consultants at StratComms UK say that it does depend, objectively speaking. Consider the following two scenarios away from the aforementioned guideline:
? If the objective is simply a client's entry into a modelling agency, reference the above scenario, but their online following is simply a few short, would purchasing a few followers be a bad option?
There would be a few caveats, but the client - or a supporting team - could build a fresh account and drive brand hard with all of the new content from their client's new agency contract(s), whilst enriching the new profile by re-sharing high quality content from 'the bank' (unknowingly prepared on the existing account). When the model reaches an equal or greater following it can take swap the new account to the original handle and/or get verified, whilst staying in the good books with any agency by growing new avenues of social value.
? The nature of some campaigns tends to see a rushed delivery, especially when 'in response' or during extraordinary circumstances. For the sake of context, let us use that scenario... an organisation's campaign needs a perceptible boost in popularity if it is to acquire the desired level of brand interest, engagement, trust, loyalty, and/or otherwise with haste before an upcoming event of importance. Organic growth, as we all know, can be too slow at times and cost much more in the mid-to-long term. If the purchase of followers or engagement to drive organic growth worked to the ends of a short-term project featuring a one-time international event, well, is it wrong? It would be illogical to treat the situation as a marketing manager might a permanent company page, no?
The latter opens up a can of social and professional ethics if it were to be done by an agency, for example; but as a commonly seen scenario we wish to prompt discussion. You're welcome to share your thoughts to [email protected].
Social media is ever-evolving, as must our tactics through objective evaluation and ethical reasoning.
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