Instagram Ambassador Scams

Have you ever gotten a comment on your Instagram post saying something along the lines of “hey gorgeous! Dm us for a collab!!,” often with a few too many exclamation points and emojis? Or have you gotten an advertisement asking you to apply to become an ambassador for a company selling bikinis or eco-friendly leggings? If not, wonderful! You haven’t been targeted by an Instagram ambassador scam. If so, hopefully you were able to avoid it, but if not don’t feel bad. These scams are predatory and primarily target young, female users with relatively low follower counts.

The basic premise of the scam is this: they play off of the unrealistic aspiration of influencer status that Instagram promotes, then pull in young women to buy and market their products. These are usually small clothing companies, but they could also be beauty, jewelry, social/eco conscious or other lifestyle type brands. They’ll usually make contact with you by commenting on your posts, often liking other posts or temporarily following you as well. For the purposes of this article, I DMed a few of their accounts and mostly got back replies from a bot. I asked several accounts for a comment, but none replied. Here is one of our conversations:

ME: Hi, I'm interested in learning more about being an ambassador!

@hc.jewellerywomen: Hey, thanks for reaching out. 😊 We like your style and we think it fits perfectly with our products! Please have a look on our page or website and let us know if you think our products are your style too. 💕

ME: Yes, your products are beautiful!

HC: Great!💖 For joining us you’ll receive huge discounts, free products, page features and 20% commission payouts. To get your 20% code to share, all you need to do is choose your favorite item(s) on our store and place your order. We have an exclusive 50% discount for you right now, but I must warn you the slots are filling up quickly, so please hurry before they’re all gone. If you’re interested in this, let us know and we will send you the discount code so you can join us! Sounds good? 😊

ME: Actually, I'm a writer working on a story about Instagram Ambassadorships. Would you be willing to comment or to answer a few more questions about your business?

HC: You can apply code HC50 at checkout for 50% off your favorite item(s). 💕 Just contact us here afterwards so we can setup your own code to share and start our collaboration. 🤗 Click here to shop 👇🏼💖 hc-jewellerywomen.com

ME: Can I talk to a human please?

So as you can see, this brand isn’t offering to actually pay me for my time, or give me the products they want me to market. Instead, they offer a discount off of their (probably artificially high priced) products. The scam is the same if you go through their ads and either DM an account or “apply” through an online form that will automatically approve you, sending you an email with a similar message to the Instagram bots. One of the reasons that these accounts are successful is that the system through which influencers endorse and market products can appear similar to people who are vulnerable, desperate, or unaware. Influencers often partner with brands to promote their products. The difference is that they receive payment and/or free products, sign contracts and have business relationships that exist outside of Instagram DMs. You can be sure that no brand is looking to really compensate you for your time to market their product to your 500 followers.

Instagram ambassador scams profit off of a much deeper problem: unrealistic beauty and lifestyle ideals that are really only accessible to the thin, white, rich and otherwise privileged people. These ideals, once marketed only by magazines and Hollywood, have now moved to social media where they push young girls and women to aspire to perfection, one like and follow at a time. It isn’t your fault if you’ve fallen for this or any other online scam. Scammers are constantly finding new ways to evolve their industry to keep up with changing technology and social media trends, and in this case they’re playing off insecurities supported by a framework of systemic oppressions that have existed for generations. Until these systems of oppression are dismantled, just keep in mind that scams like this will continue to plague your internet experience. The lesson is that it pays to be skeptical. If something seems too good to be true, it probably is. It’s always good to do a little extra research so you know where exactly you’re sending your money.