How to Thoroughly Check for Fake Instagram Followers

Bonus: Click the below button to download free checklist for spotting fake Instagram followers…

A study by Media Kix found that one of the biggest concerns’ businesses have while choosing influencers is spotting fake followers and inauthentic engagement.

This not a surprise as businesses need to generate a profit over what they pay influencers. And if an influencer they are working with has a lot of fake followers, they won’t get a proper return of investment. Fake followers cost businesses over $1.3 billion annually.

This is something we take seriously at Shoutcart too. This is one of the reasons why we manually vet every influencer account before listing them on Shoutcart (after they apply). We filter out accounts with fake followers and give them a low influencer score. You can see this score on an account.

Accounts with real followers and engagement get a higher score. We also display success rate that shows likelihood of an influencer completing the campaign and following through with an order. This is based on previous campaigns.

So, to help you find the right Instagram influencers, whether you are searching for them on or off Shoutcart, we put together this guide for you. Here you will learn how to thoroughly check an account for fake Instagram followers and engagement before engaging in a partnership with them.

Use a fake follower checker:

The easiest way to check for fake Instagram followers is by using a fake follower checker. A fake follower checker is a tool that analyses an account and tells you the number of fake suspicious followers and/or real Instagram followers.

One of the most popular tools for this is FameAudit. It is free for personal use and has other powerful features that are paid per use.

All you need to do there is search influencers Instagram username and it will show you the average and expected amount of engagement levels an account of that size should drive. It also estimates the number of real followers.

Don’t worry too much if an account has small amount of suspicious followers as this is normal. There are several bots out there that follow real accounts to make themselves appear as natural as possible.

Bonus: Click the below button to download free checklist for spotting fake Instagram followers…

Use an engagement calculator:

Another way to check for fake followers is by calculating engagement. People can buy both fake followers and engagement. But fewer people purchase engagement. Therefore, it would be better for you to analyze engagement instead of followers while choosing influencers. Follower fraud will be easier to spot when analysing engagement.

A tool you can use to check engagement is Kicksta.

It shows you the engagement rate of an account and it also displays a chart that shows the average engagement levels an account should drive depending upon the number of followers it has. Most accounts you analyze will have similar levels of engagement when compared with this chart.

So, if an account is driving engagement that is too high or low, it indicates that it has fake followers or engagement.

But remember that there are certain niches like humor where the engagement rate can be a lot higher. And there are boring niches where engagement can be lower than normal.

Check who is liking the posts:

Instagram lets you see the followers who are liking a post.

You can also click on the ‘likers’ to see what they post. If you find that most of these accounts haven’t posted much or have posted very little, you can be certain that the engagement is fake.

Even if they post something that seems a little off, you will have your answer. If you have been using Instagram for a while you will know what people normally post.

Read the comments and check out the people who are leaving them:

Another way to check for fake followers and engagement is by reading comments. If an account has a good following and its posts get a lot of likes, the posts should be getting comments as well. If the posts are getting very few or no comments, the likes could be fake.

If you see comments you should vet them out as well. There should be some comments that are lengthy and insightful and some comments which are short and the comments should also be receiving likes. If all the comments are short and superficial, it is an indication of fake engagement.

Here again, click on the users leaving the comments and check out their accounts to verify if they are real.

Check follower growth:

Another way to check for fake followers is by tracking follower growth. If you analyze an account with Socialblade, it will show the follower growth. Most accounts will show a consistent follower growth with some loss in followers like the below one.

But if an account shows a sudden growth in follower count for a day or two and then it drops immediately, it is probably because they purchased followers on that day. Sometimes accounts get an influx of a lot of followers because a post they published or a post in which they were tagged in went viral. So, you can check the account to see if the growth coincided with this.

Usually, when something like this happens the number of followers the account receives will slowly dwindle. It won’t all just drop off the next day.

Ask the influencer for case studies:

Another way to be certain if an account has real followers is by asking the influencer for case studies. Some influencers take their services very seriously and will provide details on the results they drove for previous businesses that hired them.

So, if they have case studies you can check them out and contact the people that hired them (if necessary).

Now use these methods to check influencers for fake Instagram followers…

These are all the top tactics you can use to check for fake Instagram followers. Make sure you use all of them. This might take a while, but the effort will definitely be worth it as you will pick top quality influencers who will help you generate a better ROI from your efforts.  

The above process will also help you calculate a more appropriate fee by taking the real number of followers and engagement into consideration and not the fake number.

If you’re busy and don’t want to spend a lot of time vetting influencers for fake followers, you can always use Shoutcart. We vet the influencers ourselves and display a score. The higher the score, the more number of real followers the influencer will have.

How do you check for fake Instagram followers? Did I forget to include any important tips? Please leave your comments below.

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