7 Tips To Quickly Boost Your Instagram Followers Without The Risk Of Getting Banned

Does your business need an Instagram followers boost? For most brands, the answer would be yes: More followers equals more engagement and ultimately more sales, so no matter how many followers you have, you can always benefit from gaining a few more.

But Instagram growth can be tricky. Instagram isn’t afraid to ban accounts that are looking for growth — people who utilize tactics such as buying fake followers, creating fake accounts, or aggressively following and unfollowing other users. If you set about Instagram growth the wrong way, you might be banned for 24 hours or more, or get shadow banned so your followers won’t see your posts.

Luckily though, there are plenty of safe ways that you can see fast Instagram growth. Here are seven tips that can help you get the Instagram followers boost you need, without getting banned.

#1. Use an Instagram Growth Service

An Instagram growth service can be a great method of getting more followers, but only if you work with the correct kind of service. Some Instagram “growth services” want you to buy pre-loaded accounts with followers. Most of these followers are bots, so that’s a bad idea; you should never work with a growth service who wants you to purchase followers. Instead, look for a service that simply automates the process of the hard work it takes to see Instagram growth.

Kicksta is an example of a high-quality Instagram growth service that won’t get you banned. Instead, Kicksta’s safe like-for-like method can give you a quick Instagram followers boost. When you sign up with Kicksta, you provide Kicksta with a list of your competitors, influencers in your niche, and any targets accounts whose followers you want to follow your account. Chances are, the users who follow those accounts will be interested in yours, too. So Kicksta will use your account to begin interacting with those users. Some of those people will come follow your account — and from there, it’s your job to post high-quality content and convert them into customers.

Kicksta is safe because it’s not invasive; it likes other users’ photos instead of following or DM’ing them. The tool also ramps up slowly, liking just a few photos each day at first and gradually increasing the amount of outreach. When you use an organic growth service like Kicksta, you can trust that you’re safe and won’t be banned.

#2. Utilize Hashtags

Hashtags are a method of categorizing your posts, helping them reach more people who care about what you’re promoting. It’s important to define a hashtag strategy, rather than using random any tags you can think of. How can you come up with a strategy to promote Instagram growth? 

First, use a mixture of small and large hashtags; while common hashtags with a lot of followers (such as #fashion) might seem helpful at first glance, your post is likely to get lost in the shuffle. Hashtags that are too specific, however (#mensnewfashion), might not get enough views. Try to strike a balance of mid-sized hashtags. For instance, Champion used their branded hashtag to increase brand recognition in addition to adding a few descriptive hashtags based on what was in the post (“#Streetwear”). 

You’ll also need to decide how many hashtags to put in each post. Using more hashtags will give you more visibility, but it can also appear spammy. Run some tests to figure out what the optimal number of hashtags is for you. Many brands find a sweet spot between six and 12 tags. 

#3. Do Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing can give you an Instagram followers boost because it exposes you to a group of people who might not be familiar with your company, but are very interested in what you have to offer. The concept of influencer marketing is simple: You send an influencer your product/or pay them a fee, and they post photos for their followers to see. When selecting an influencer you should make sure that your goals and brands align, so their followers will be interested in your product.

One company that does this well is HelloFresh. HelloFresh partners with influencers such as Josie Balka (formerly Josie Bates), a reality TV star and social media influencer with 157,000 Instagram followers and an adorable new baby. Josie often posts videos on her Instagram story showing how easy and quick the HelloFresh meal subscription boxes are to use. The information is relevant to her followers, many of whom are probably young moms themselves. Using Josie as an influencer drives more followers and more business over to HelloFresh.

How can you choose the influencers who will give you the biggest Instagram followers boost possible? Once you have a certain influencer in mind, spend some time on their profile to get a sense for their target audience. If their target audience matches up with yours — same gender, age range, interests, and lifestyle — that’s a good sign.

#4. Cross-Promote

Get creative about pulling in leads and customers who interact with you on other platforms and know about your brand, but might not necessarily be aware of your Instagram account. You can do this by including a link to your Instagram profile on other platforms, including:

• Your website homepage (in a footer or sidebar)
• Your email newsletters (in the footer) or email signature
• The description of your YouTube videos
• Your blog posts 
• Facebook and Twitter posts

Many platforms, such as WordPress and email design tools, allow you to include premade social icons so visitors can jump to your Instagram with just one click. Other places however, you’ll need to get a little more creative. For instance, if you’ve just published a new IGTV video, include a link to the video in a Facebook or Twitter post with language inviting people to check it out. It’s always worth reminding people that you have other social media channels.

And even if you’re using platforms where a social icon is automatically included — such as an email template builder — feel free to be a little more direct. In your next email newsletter, for example, try adding a section that showcases what’s happening on Instagram (“Come check out our employee spotlight on Instagram!”). Then add a highly visible CTA button that links to your IG account. Social icons in the footer can sometimes be overlooked, so a more hands-on approach never hurts.

#5. Host Contests and Giveaways

Contests and giveaways are two of the most popular and effective ways to get an Instagram followers boost. After all, who doesn’t want free stuff? According to a survey of several marketers, increasing followers on social media is the top benefit of giveaways, with brand awareness and engagement close behind.

So what do you need to know before launching your next giveaway? First, outline your main goal behind the giveaway. If your priority is to get an Instagram followers boost, that’s going to effect the way you structure the giveaway. To get more followers, you can set up the terms and conditions of the giveaway as following:

• Follow us
• Tag three friends in the comments

This way, users have to follow you to enter the giveaway — and their friends might decide to enter too, which means more new followers and more tags. Give away one of your products, a gift card to your online store, or collaborate with another brand to do a joint giveaway. 

You might also decide to run a more sophisticated contest — something where users need to put in a little more effort beyond giving you a follow. Many brands use contests as a method of sourcing user-generated content, asking their followers to post photos of themselves using the product. For Instagram growth, that’s a win-win — you’ll be able to use that user-generated content as marketing material. Giveaways and contests are both excellent ways to drive more followers to you.

#7. Implement Geotags

A geotag is a method of tagging your location online; on Instagram, the geotag in a post shows up right under your username and before the photo. How are geotags helpful? Anytime someone clicks on a specific geotag, such as “Atlanta,” they’ll be able to see all of the posts under that geotag — including yours. People can also search for posts geotagged in a certain location. Geotagging increases your visibility, helping a lot more people find your account. 

For local businesses, geotags are hugely helpful. You can tag your city or your exact location to reach a small niche audience. And like hashtags, you may want to experiment with including a mix of popular big-city tags and smaller local locations. If your business is located outside of Chicago, for instance, test tagging some posts as Chicago and others with the name of your specific suburb. Casting a wide net can be helpful, but for local businesses, your ideal customers are probably right down the street — so experiment with a mixture of tags.

You don’t have to have a brick and mortar building to use geotags; even e-commerce companies can get an Instagram followers boost from geotags. If you sell strictly online, experiment with tagging your posts as New York, San Francisco, or another big city. This might help you gain more visibility since so many people frequently use those location tags.

Instagram Followers Boost

There’s no need to buy followers or likes when you can get them honestly instead. By using these seven tactics, you can begin to see growth in your Instagram account and get the follower boost you need.