In the past decade alone, data collected has shown an astronomical rise in the use of social media. Staring off with now pioneered sites like MySpace and Friendster in the early 2000’s, social media has come a long way with a multitude of different platforms, each unique in its diversity and exceptional in their popularity. Some of the most pre-eminent ones include Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Twitter, each with a prodigious number of diversified users from all over the world. In June 2018, after about 8 years of existence, Instagram officially reached 1 billion monthly active users.
One of the most perceptible reasons for such an enormous user base is due to sites like Facebook and Instagram, which have succeeded in becoming exceptional platforms for marketing and advertisement. With sponsored posts, one can not only easily advertise their products, with some additional cost, but they can also boost their advertisement posts and make sure more people are reached. Both on Instagram and Facebook, a person can easily set up a business with the least amount of cost, or advertise their business with professional strategic marketing with minimal capital. Hence explaining the still expanding user base, which includes everyone from the common person to corporate businesses, at a global level. So much so that people are now able to earn money through their social media accounts in more ways than one.
Given that one has enough followers, an individual is likely to be able to earn profits through their page. Depending on one’s reach, be it substantial enough, it has become common for companies to pay these individuals to use their products on the page and get noticed. For example, if a company wants to promote one of its products, it can contact a number of social media influencers with an adequate following and send them PR packages or pay them to use the brand name or product on their page/channel. On the basis of this, many of these said social media influencers have started earning additionally by setting a price for PR, shout out on stories, promotions through Instagram highlights, video posts, etc., varying according to their following base.
Another practice becoming increasingly common is the buying and selling of entire Facebook and Instagram accounts, provided there are enough followers. Although it goes strictly against Instagram rules, people are now creating accounts solely for the purpose of selling them after establishing a certain amount of follower base. According to the more common one-cent-per-follower estimate, one can buy an account with 50k followers for $500 and so on. Moreover, there are entire websites dedicated to this business, where one can go to either buy or sell his/her Facebook or Instagram accounts. It is progressively becoming a lucrative market as anyone can now acquire a huge follower base in an instant, and earn money through sponsorship and PR. Read about the decline of the newspapers.
Regardless of how facile this process may seem, it is anything but. This is because when it comes to buying and selling, the demands are increasingly comprehensive and elaborate. To put it another way, only the accounts singularly belonging to a specific niche or theme can sell fast and high. Some of the examples can include accounts dedicated to fashion, makeup, fandoms, animal videos, memes etc. Even after that there is always a distinguishing price variant, which varies according to the number of followers an account has, or interaction percentage, which refers to the amount of people looking at the content and responding, that comes into play. This becomes an ample reason for the prices to keep fluctuating. An example could be given of how, with the same number of followers, a fashionista or a makeup page might sell for a much higher price than a meme account.
Not only that, but for an account to be qualified as sellable, it has to be impersonalised. Meaning, the person who is running the page should keep the content related to the topic and not have any personal posts uploaded if they want to sell the page.
According to Instagram’s, and several other social media platform’s, terms and conditions, selling one’s account is not allowed as it may cause personal information to leak. However, since there is not a strict check-up on it or any law against it, this business is actively blooming.
As this business, at its core, strictly depends on the number of followers, people have come up with multiple ways to boost their follower count, including creating and using bots. These bots will follow, like, subscribe and comment under other people’s posts just to increase an account’s reach and engagement or interaction. Instagram has taken an austere action against this by developing their algorithm in such a manner that it can easily distinguish between real people and bots. If an account actively uses services that provides them with fake followers, it will be sent a warning by Instagram and the next step is the automatic permanent deactivation of the page if the account persists in going against the rules.
Another, somewhat successful, way people have adopted to boost their follower count is by paying people to follow their page. As these are real people who follow an account, it does not go against Instagram’s or any other social media’s rules and, therefore, is a fortunate way for accounts to gain followers, depending upon how much capital one is willing to spend. This has caused many a website to emerge which help these accounts through “A Follow for A Follow” and has turned into another way one can make money through social media.
Instagram, Facebook, and other platforms have different marketing strategies to engage its users and build a name. For example, Facebook does it by minimising the cost of doing business initially and further on, while Instagram is more centered on building relationships through interactions, which eventually leads to an ascending follower base. Establishing a brand is easier done on Facebook which also has an effective advertising strategy to set up and grow one’s business. While on Instagram one can use hashtags, an effectual way to increase reach, and post based on what the people prefer to increase followers.
Depending on the requirements of a buyer, each platform, in its essence, has the potential to help grow their personal brand or help them earn money regardless of whether the account originally belonged to them or not. And the seller can settle on a specific niche, grow the account, and sell depending upon the specifications of the page.
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