If it isn’t a rule, then I’ll ignore your comment.
Feel free to do so 
People with such positive attitude on their 3rd comment are always welcomed here. They usually get their questions answered the fastest and with the utmost care and respect.
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now it’s not working, the top posts section is broken and showing posts from no-namers.
People that are coming back here: This topic was created 2016 and the rules for instagram where very different two years ago.
Everything changed when the ad-nation attacked. It’s harder to grow your account now and a good idea is to buy ads since Instagram/Facebook are becoming a sales plattform.
There were times when you could use blackhat methods to increase your google ranking, now if you do you’ll get banned from there faster than you can say SEO.
Try to grow your business, or whatever genuine, or invest in ads and research how to make good performing ones.
MY two cents. (Leaders don’t be pissed, I’m sure you have something better to do)
The whole point of this forum and the software associated with it is to avoid having to buy Instagram ads…
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Says who?
What software do you mean?
Jarvee, for example.
Heard about it.
Regardless, it really isn’t a wise decision for someone to spend money on Instagram ads to grow a following, as Instagram can choose to reduce reach at any time, making the majority of the Instagram followers gained through the Instagram ads less valuable. This is exactly what happened when people grew fan pages on Facebook.
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Great point. Instagram cut reach when ads where introduced. They will cut down fake engagement and automation services too.
Spending money on ads is, contrary to what you’re saying, a wise choice when the amount spent is less than what you would be spent on other things to grow the account.
I don’t know anyone who’s spending more on Instagram automation than they would to get the same results via. Instagram ads.
Someone who knows what they’re doing can get a much better bang for their buck with Instagram automation than spending money on Instagram ads.
Yes, Instagram is going the Facebook route, but there’s only so far they can go before regular people, not marketers, start to leave the platform because they’re getting “action blocked” after viewing 1 Instagram story (which is already starting to happen).
To sit here and say “oh, Instagram is decreasing reach and they know who’s botting/automating actions so don’t bother just buy ads” is really not helpful in the slightest. There are SO many techniques that can be used to make automation more powerful that only the most advanced Instagram marketers (like the ones on this forum) know. The reason why these techniques aren’t being given away is because people are tired of seeing every technique get destroyed by random people tossing a new account on a cheap IPV6 proxy and trying to follow 2000 people a day.
I assume the number of people you know that are spending money on IG ads is very low, also I’m pretty sure you don’t know how much they spend either and what their results are. Correct me if I’m wrong.
That’s right, the overall reach someone can get through automation is amazing and might by far outweigh the reach you can get with ads when it comes to price.
There’s a catch though: Using automation carries risks with it and you will NEVER be able to target people as good with automation than you will with ads.
And this is where it get’s interesting. The bang for the buck really comes down to who are you targeting?
Please show to the feature on any automation software that let’s you target people that made purchases in the last thirty days, that have a certain job title, have just become a mother, work in a certain company, have an iPhone or simply live in North Carolina, are interested in hair products and are between 18 and 32 years old?
You simply can’t.
I’d like to point you to this thread: https://mpsocial.com/t/guide-getting-started-with-instagram-ads-a-step-by-step-tutorial/12155
Not true. A $200 shout out will yield 2-1 or even 3-1 yeild over a add. I paid for both when I first started many times and wasted money. The results from shout out was so good I created accounts to shout main one out. For the price of MP monthly over 2.5 years it grew to a few million followers. No adds could ever deliver that for such a low budget
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It is true.
Great choice by you to ignore 80% of what I said and look for a hole in my reply, chapeu!
But this doesn’t contribute anything, also what are you trying to prove?
What I said was that if you spend less on ads than what you spend on other things and it gets you better results, than ads is the better option.
Where is the catch in that?
It’s not 2016 anymore and the landscape has changed, buddy. Don’t use arguments from the past in a
discussion on today and the future IF they’re not applicable anymore.
Take targeting into the discussion as well if you want to discuss what makes more since.
Also who are we talking about? Someoine that just wants to blindly grow their following, a business (small, medium, big), are we talking about what’s right for branding? Is it an E-commerce store or a local business that we’re trying to raise awereness to?
To just stand there and say:" Oh, shoutouts are the best, automation is the best, fuck everything, fuck ads!" will not get you very far.
Totally agree on this one. Honestly targeting is not as pinpoint on fb ads because you are still targeting a wide audience based on interest etc… But a well grown account with specific interest could do much better than fb ads.
I don’t really see a point in this discussion. Both automation and ig/fb ads are great, if you’re great at them. You just have to use the methods wisely. I’ve used fb/ig ads in certain scenarios and yielded up to 50x ROI and a great followback rate… Same with automation , if not more. All you have to do is to test and learn. And repeat. 
True that.
a lot of people on here just read something someone else said and will crawl up their cracks for attention and repeat after them without any knowledge at all.
As, you said, the best strategy is to test and learn.
Lucky you!
Haha. U looking for quick thrill?
Withdrawing that post because I don’t wanna start an argument with people looking for fun going around the forum splattering exactly what they do not know. 
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