Instagram and other social media accounts have proven valuable marketing platforms. Furthermore, they dont just have uses in marketing but can also be a source of income. However, IP bans and restrictions can be a real pain to deal with if you want to manage multiple accounts. So how can you start managing many social media accounts without the threat of an IP ban?
In this article, well be covering why its difficult to manage multiple accounts and how to use tools such as a location-specific German proxy from a reliable provider like Smartproxy to help you manage all your accounts.
What Makes Managing Multiple Instagram Accounts Difficult?
Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms in the world at the moment, running just slightly behind Facebook. With an estimated 500 million daily users, it makes sense that marketers have noticed the potential of advertising businesses on this platform. But, its not as easy as simply creating your accounts and posting your marketing content. That might work if you run a small business and only need a single account. It wont work for large companies that need accounts for different regions or departments or for marketing agencies that are in charge of many accounts.
This is because social media accounts, especially Instagram ones, are notorious for placing IP restrictions on the number of accounts created. This means that only a certain number of Instagram accounts can be created from the same IP address. Any accounts that exceed the limit will be flagged by the platform and may become temporarily blocked or permanently banned.
This makes it difficult if youre a multinational brand with many departments or stores, as a single account may not be effective. Statistics have shown that large brands with many different products can increase the interaction with their social media accounts if they create product-specific accounts. For example, a large clothing brand can get more interaction if they divide their accounts into womens clothing, mens clothing and childrens clothing. This is because the target audience can easily find what they want and interact with content relevant to them. But how can you do this without incurring penalties or an IP ban?
What Is an IP Ban?
When you create a social media account on Instagram, the platform links that account directly to your IP address. But, to ensure that people dont misuse the platform for spam, they limit the number of accounts linked to a single IP address. This number is very low, usually between four or five, and was meant to allow household members to each have an account.
When you create more than the allowed number of Instagram accounts from one IP address, the platform gets notified, and in an effort to protect other users from potential spam, may block your account. The platform may even block all accounts, not just the last one created. This makes it a big problem for individuals who need to manage many accounts.
Another instance of where an IP ban may come in is if you created an Instagram account on your IP address and then get the services of a social media marketer in another country and give them access to your account. Instagram will notice the log-ins from these two different areas and, in some cases, may suspect that the account has been hacked or hijacked and will proceed to block the account with an IP ban.
How Can a Proxy Help?
The only way to manage many accounts without worrying about an IP ban is to use Instagram proxies. These are virgin residential proxies that have never been used to create an Instagram account and, as such, can be used to create up to four new Instagram accounts without incurring any bans. You can even use location-specific proxies, such as a German proxy if your target audience is in Germany and you want to make sure your account appears to be located in the same country. By using a location-specific Instagram proxy, you will have the added advantage of showing up in the feeds of users in that country as the algorithms work to show local content that is popular first.
Where to Buy Proxies?
You can choose proxies for Instagram account management from many different providers. But, when it comes to paying for a proxy, its a good idea to consider quality over cost. It wont be very beneficial to save $20 on a cheap proxy, but get all your accounts banned. In the long run, this can have a much bigger financial implication than the $20 you saved.
Can Proxies Help With Automation?
Although proxies themselves do not automate any process when it comes to managing your social media, you are able to connect other automation tools and bots to your proxy. By doing this, these tools and bots will be able to work more effectively and wont be detected by the social media platform you choose to automate tasks for.
Final Thoughts
Instagram is a great marketing platform with a lot of untapped potential for many individuals and businesses. But, its important to know that managing many accounts without a proxy will be impossible without risking an IP ban. Luckily, many reliable proxy providers can help you avoid being banned by hiding the IP address linked to the account behind a different virgin IP address.