Have you ever bought anything online before? Many people have. Some of us have had amazing experiences but many more people have had really bad experiences. I have worked as an online marketing expert for over 10 years and yet, I have been scammed by an online business. I haven’t been scammed in a long time, but this only happened because I took out time to identify accounts that businesses that are likely to scam people.
We will focus on identifying fake Instagram businesses or Instagram businesses that are likely to scam you.
1. Scanty content or most of the content shared on the same day
Fake accounts usually have little to no content. The person behind a fake account is busy scamming people and does not have time to post content.
2. They send personal account details for you to pay into
Be careful if an online vendor shares his/her personal account for payments. Be more careful if the name of the account is different from anything on the Instagram account.
3. The number of followers greatly exceed the engagement
Whenever the number of followers greatly exceeds the engagement, this might indicate that the account is fake or set up to scam people.
4. Inexplicable and sudden increases in engagement
Some tools can help you track to determine if there have been sudden increases in followers and engagement. Tools like Social Blade or Hype Auditor can help you check for these sorts of spikes and increases.
5. All comments are from the same profiles
Sometimes fraudsters work in groups. They have their friends and “work colleagues” likes, comment and engage with their posts to draw in unsuspecting victims.
Wondering if a business is professional? Asides verifying that they have credibility online, if they use SocialPay to send invoices and receive payments, that’s also a good sign. SocialPay has an escrow feature. What this means is that payments are held so that if you have a legitimate complaint with evidence, your money can be sent back to you. This way you won’t lose money to a fraudulent vendor.
Also, SocialPay helps businesses who need to create a professional look and feel around their brand even while still in the startup phase by creating invoices and payment links for transactions. A vendor that uses SocialPay can also offer instalment payments to you, the customer. SocialPay ensures that the vendor is not shortchanged.
Do you know any business owners? SocialPay is giving the next 10,000 merchants access to a one-month interest-free loan up to a maximum amount of N 1,000,000. Make sure all your friends running their business do not miss out on this opportunity.
