A bot is an automated software that interacts with other Instagram accounts so you don’t have to do it manually. These bots can be great when programmed correctly. As, they have the ability to grow your follower account and allow more people to discover your content.

On the other hand, a badly programmed account can look incredibly spammy and will make users have a terrible opinion of your account. It could ruin your business’ reputation before it has even started. So before you look towards investing in Instagram bots make sure they are well programmed.

It is important to have a well-organized Instagram with a clear plan of action and aesthetic. There is no point leading people to your account to find it’s low-quality. How your account looks at first glance is often the way people decide to follow you or not. So, make sure it’s high-quality. A simple way to execute this is to have a visual grid plan, engaging caption and schedule your posts ahead of time.

Find the Right Bot

There are many websites claiming to provide bot service but like many IT services, you get the quality you pay for. Most good bot services start at between $15 and $30 and will offer a free VPN.

Some tools will just like relevant tags, some will provide you with a list of ‘desired accounts’ and will offer you fake followers.

Don’t Automate Comments.

Automating the bots to comment on accounts will inevitably get you in trouble because the bots will start to leave irrelevant and sometimes insensitive comments.

A bot has the potential to interact with hundreds of photos and videos a day so it’s impossible to teach a bot to create contextually relevant comments for everything it comes across. Generally, bots are programmed to leave generically positive comments like ‘Great Shot’ ‘Love It’ or ‘Amazing’, not only is this annoyingly spammy but when posted on the wrong post can appear distasteful and offensive.

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Only automate likes, this is a non-intrusive way to be discovered and will cause less of a PR issue if it goes wrong. Likes are a subtle nudge that better as less worried about getting a like from a stranger then a random generic comment.

Automating likes has the same effect as paying Instagram to sponsor your account. Liking accounts creates hundreds of opportunities for your Instagram to be discovered by people, this why choosing an engaging username that is relevant to your content is so important.

No Engagement

The real issue with using automated bots, especially if you have a business Instagram account. People are getting more and more savvy about why a random business account is leaving smiley emojis on pictures of their lunch and pets. It’s more then likely that you won’t get people to genuinely connect with your account from one randomly place comment.

Terms and Conditions

The real problem with bots is they access Instagram’s API without the social media’s platform’s permission. This violates Instagram’s terms of use and if you get caught your account will be suspended or terminated.

Instagram has also created limits based on your age, number of followers and activity. On average you have 150 likes, 60 comments and 60 unfollows or followers. In theory, a user could never go through this many posts unless they are spammers or trolls. Bots can perform hundreds of activities per hour which will flag your account to Instagram as being unnatural.

Instagram might not suspend your account if they deem fraudulent, they might instead shadowban, this will make your pictures and photos invisible to non-followers and they will not appear in any hashtags.

You will still be able to post content and interact with your current followers but you won’t be able to gain new ones. This will stall any career or business progression.

So maybe it’s not wise to reliant on Instagram bots.

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What’s the alternative?

Not all automation tools pose a threat to your account but it is always a risk. There are other strategies that can help increase engagement.

It’s quite easy to engage with followers yourself or hire a virtual assistant who can leave authentic, relevant and heartfelt comments on content. This will stop you having to worry about ruining your reputation. Many online freelance websites will help you employ a virtual assistant who will dedicate their working day to liking and commenting on relevant posts.

If you want to personally engage in new followers put aside an hour a day to take the time to get to know potential customers; comment, like and follower accounts that fit into your demographic. Try and be personal in your comments, make a specific compliment about the image or video rather than leaving an emoji.

If you want to reach a lot of people without spending time manually engaging with users, try Instagram ads. Instagram ads are a great way to reach new people without having to find relevant users and comment on their posts.

Even though Instagram bots make it easy to build up a following the results they generate are not worth it. Bots don’t understand the context of situations so the comments they leave may be very awkward and inappropriate. A wrong comment on the wrong post could be a huge PR disaster that will really embarrass your brand or business. Worse case scenario bots can cause your Instagram account to be suspended due to a violation of terms and conditions.

There are many ways of growing your following without using bots. Do the work yourself, it’s more accurate and will get you more followers who actually care about your content and want to engage in you. If you focus on quality not quantity, in the long run, it will be better for your brand and your business. Set up an Instagram scheduler, this will allow you to stager outposts throughout the day so you don’t have to be continually online and you can post when other time zones are active.