How did Instagram turned into a sci-fi horror? And what to do about it?

Can all of you imagine this empty world for a second. Machines had risen in a fight against humanity and only you have survived this sci-fi apocalypse?

Well, that’s what I felt every time I’ve posted an amazing photo to Instagram. Spending time to make a nicest shot with my not so nice iPhone camera, editing it, adding heartbreaking caption, digging through the best hashtags possible, timing a perfect moment to post it, and then…

Next 20–30 minutes, I was watching how my post receives likes from people I’ve never heard of and probably won’t hear again, how I am gaining some followers, who will unfollow me the next day. And how I get random comments which are flattering but totally soulless. What is the point of all of this?

Bots follow bots, bots comment bots, bots like bots…

Still confused what I am talking about? – There are services out there which after you’ve signed up to them, they start to follow, like and comment in Instagram for you. So your Instagram account becomes a bot, which acts in the social network for you, and that way tries to accumulate followers for you.

I keep asking myself, what is the point of it, if you use such service and everyone else uses it, then bots are following bots, bots comment bots, bots like bots, and no one actually benefits out of it, because no information is passed to people.

Fight for it – time has come!

So what to do about this and how to engage real people into your Instagram account? My advices to keep your profile more engaging and interesting to people:

1. Use an actual hashtags you would describe picture or topic with. Be consistent with what you post, and hashtags you use. Try to build an audience around those hashtags and don’t follow the trending hashtags which are suggested by services out there. Those hashtags are popular, but among other bots and not people.
2. Find out timing which works best for you. There are ton of articles on when you should post and when you shouldn’t, but I found all of them irrelevant, because you have to figure out what works best for you and your audience. Social networks let us interact with people all over the world and everyone lives in different time zones, thus social networks never sleep, but you target audience does!
3. Try to be as creative as possible and make bright, warm content. It obviously depends on what are you focusing on, but usually social network is a place where people come for relief from outer world and they want to see something aesthetically pleasing.
4. Create stories and set up live videos, so you could appropriately realize how many organic followers do you have and how many people are engaged with your Instagram profile on a regular basis. There are no bots there. Yet!

Oh wow, this was my first post in internet ever, and I would appreciate your comments, because writing it was one scary thing to do :) But more articles are coming soon.

Also don’t hesitate to follow me on instagram for nice and motivational photos: @ibakurov Thank you – it means a world to me ❤