Let's Talk About "Shadow Banning."
Being “shadow-banned” is a term being thrown around a lot recently, and if you haven’t heard about it yet well, welcome to the party. Lately, users have been complaining of experiencing low reach and stagnant growth on Instagram. Frustrations are high among creators, business accounts and those who are working on growing their IG accounts. But is shadow banning a real thing?
Well, the answer is yes, and no.
What is the Instagram Shadow Ban?
According to the guys at Tailwind, “an Instagram shadow ban refers to the platform limiting your content reach by restricting visibility.” One main indicator of a shadow ban could be that your hashtagged content is not appearing on Explore pages to anyone new, only your followers. Or, you’ll notice you aren’t reaching many new people.
2. So, what causes an Instagram Shadow Ban? (+ How to avoid it)
Instagram’s very own Adam Mosseri spoke out about the so-called shadow banning issue, stating that this isn’t happening to accounts at random...However, the accounts that are affected are those that are violating Instagram's community guidelines in some way. Thus, their reach and visibility for posts are severely limited as a result.
Although, it’s not clearly stated just how Instagram determines what content gets restricted or “shadow-banned” on the platform.
However, you should avoid doing the following things to ensure you don’t get penalised:
This is the most blindly obvious one - but avoid violating Instagram’s community guidelines by posting inappropriate content or spreading misinformation.
At all costs, avoid paying for fake engagements such as likes or comments. Don’t use bots to increase your follower count and say “no thanks” to engagement pods. 🙅♀️
Avoid general “spammy activity” - for instance, don’t use over 30 hashtags in a single post.
Don’t comment on too many posts or follow too many people within an hour.
Avoid using banned hashtags. While Instagram hasn’t released an official list, here’s a blog post from Later.com with certain hashtags to avoid.
3. How do you know if you’ve violated any of the gram’s guidelines, even if it is by accident? To check:
> Visit your profile
> Click the three lines at the top right-hand corner
> Account
> Account status
This will tell you if you’re breaking any IG ‘laws’ if you will. If you are, then it’s likely you could be shadow banned. (This means Instagram have permission to limit who can see your profile and your content).
4. Finally, how can you remove a shadow ban?
Online Business Mentor Alex Tooby suggests the following:
● Report your shadow ban to Instagram
● Review your hashtags
● Remove apps that use bots (including scheduling apps, make sure the IG scheduling tools you’re using are Instagram-approved).
● Take a break from the gram
We hope this has shed some light on the mysterious topic of shadow banning. Make sure you follow us for more social media tips!
With Love,
The Daily Digital Team x