While we see no reason not to trust this business, this strikes us as an add-on service from a full-service agency and there’s just no way the results or customer service will justify the price tag.
NR Media Agency is a US-based social media marketing agency that happens to offer an Instagram growth service. Since this product seems to be a minor offering of theirs, the company as a whole should not be judged based on this brief overview.
This service costs $97/mo, which is on the expensive side. The going rate for automation services is about $50, which is still not cheap considering you can run one yourself practically for free.
Service Details
This is a run-of-the-mill growth service offering from a marketing agency. The agency only has two employees, so it’s obvious that the 24/7 aspect is performed while nobody is watching.
Integrity & Reputation
We see absolutely no reason not to trust this business! From what we can tell, this is an honest agency supported by full-time staff. Of course, the only dishonest part is not telling potential customers that this type of thing is against Instagram’s rules–this is why we suspect larger agencies just don’t bother. It’s not worth having to explain why a client’s account was blocked while charging them $100 per month.
Conclusion
Though this service isn’t doing anything wrong, we can’t recommend paying $100 per month from such an unknown, localized provider. I’m happy to see smaller agencies wading into the software space, but there’s no evidence supporting why a purchase here would be worth the time or money.
Jumper Media is US-based marketing agency primarily providing Instagram growth services. Unlike most services we review, which are usually clear-cut scams or well-known providers, Jumper required a lot of analysis!
If you don’t feel like reading further, our most important conclusion is that they definitely aren’t growing accounts by hand, in one huge contradiction that is exhausting to unravel. There are dozens of customer reviews supporting our conclusion.
Jumper Media’s pricing is hidden but since they have a large team and premium pitch it’s likely they’re charging well over $100 for their cheapest plan. We think this is kind of silly since they’re almost definitely running a bot and upselling it as if it’s some bespoke service.
You must set up a call with Jumper Media in order to hear prices. It’s likely that they are performing outreach to originate most of their sales or that they’re using this to hide something.
After doing further research, we realized that they probably do this to use direct sales tactics in order to get you sign up for a full year of service upfront. This is a no-no in most industries, but especially in the growth space. So much can change and you’ll feel like you were scammed.
Service Details
Jumper Media provides two clear-cut services to grow your Instagram:
We have a team of real people that will sign into your Instagram account on a phone, and start interacting with your target audience by liking their pictures and viewing their Stories.
Partner with mega-influencers to dominate Instagram in a (borderline unfair) new way.
Distilled to our language, they offer “Growth by hand” and “influencer/giveaway growth.” Each has its merits. They also link to an Influencer marketing service that we won’t get into.
Integrity & Reputation
Here’s where things more-or-less fall apart for our friends at Jumper Media.
First, we need to assess the claim that they’re growing accounts by hand.
No bots, no software. Smiling team pictured at the beach in California!
Wow, now that is a massive team. Not to invoke stereotypes, but you probably don’t expect anybody in the first row of this picture to be sitting in a back room writing computer code.
One LinkedIn search tells a different story. The company doesn’t seem to employ a single US-based woman, nor can we find evidence that they ever did.
The picture clearly isn’t fake, right? All the people in the picture have Jumper Media shirts on! Our opinion is that they paid for 15 women from a UCSD sorority to come down for the photoshoot. This is what we alluded to in our opening. The level of deception here is just impressive.
What about that “no software” claim? Seems to me like their Russian programmers might have something to say about that:
Believe it or not, you don’t bring in the Russians to do website design. They’re obviously helping with the underlying platform that grows customers’ accounts. I wonder how the customers feel.
In an extremely-rare display of force on Yelp, people are not happy with Jumper Media.
We’re shocked by what we’ve uncovered here. All of these people can’t be exaggerating. When a company “looks legit” we’re usually hesitant to give bad reviews, but this helps us believe that we should trust our gut instinct.
On Trustpilot, it’s a similar story, though they’ve padded their page with dozens of fake one-sentence reviews.
The one thing that impresses us is that many of the men in the picture above do indeed appear to be employed by Jumper Media. It’s crazy that they run such a thick sales team without adding any other services. Focusing on Instagram growth knowing you’re vulnerable to any and every change Instagram makes must make for a stressful “10,000 sqft office” environment.
Conclusion
This service claims to be a premium player but really it’s the same old type of botting sold directly to unsuspecting targets. They seem to have a large sales team who will sell to customers who won’t do the requisite research which is good for business but bad for customer satisfaction. There is no question why there are so many dissatisfied customers out there. Jumper Media oversells and under-delivers a basic product.
Social Hackettes is a social media growth agency that offers a variety of services across a number of popular platforms. We’re going to focus on their Instagram growth service.
While we’re impressed by the breadth of this agency, it’s highly unlikely that the owner is personally offering most of the services. They’re likely offered through white-label partners. This means that prices will never be as cheap as they can be and customer service may be slow because there may be communication between this service provider and contracted partners.
This service costs $50 per month with a 5-day free trial.
Service Details
All we have to say is: we are overwhelmed!
This is a buffet of services! How could you even keep track of all of them? It’s worth noting that this provider sells an Instagram growth service and also sells fake Instagram activity boosts. These two things combined don’t build confidence.
In fact, they sell an “extra like boost” with the growth plan, which is a little sketchy since, you know, it’s fake activity.
Integrity & Reputation
This service has been around for a long time, since 2017, but there’s virtually no mentions of it online. That tells us that it isn’t a very popular service and that the owner’s priorities lie with other parts of the agency. If a business has been around for four years and you can’t find a single real customer experience anywhere on the internet, that is cause for concern.
Conclusion
The agency has way too much going on and undermines trust by offering fake like services alongside an “organic” growth service. We don’t think it’s a complete scam, but it needs a lot of work to be something we’d trust with our money.
We first learned of Assistagram a few years ago. Though it seems like a typical marketing agency with a millennial flare, and generally wouldn’t be something we reviewed, the web presence of this company has us curious about what’s really going on here.
To be clear, we’re not aware of anyone having been scammed by this service and normally we wouldn’t even review a full-service agency like this. Something is just a little … off.
We don’t think it’s particularly fair to review marketing agencies without having tried them or spoken to them, so this review is written strictly from an outsider’s perspective. We will modify this review if Assistagram furnishes any information that we think is important.
This is a bespoke service that does not display prices on the website. We don’t find this particularly suspicious, though it is unprecedented in the Instagram growth industry.
Service Details
Assistagram claims to be a full-service Instagram agency.
Seems a little… I don’t know. I can’t put my finger on it, but something here is rubbing me the wrong way. There’s too much salesmanship backed up by nothing aside from the claim of having serviced “over 517 accounts.”
The full service offering is quite impressive and transcends any basic bot services.
For me, what it comes down to is that the website is extremely basic and even unprofessional for someone actually trying to attract luxury clients with huge budgets. It seems more pitched toward small wannabe-influencers who will pay a lot of money for things and never complain because they have no idea what they’re doing.
Integrity & Reputation
Let’s start with this claim:
Assistagram is an Instagram marketing agency with a network of 220 million Instagram followers to drive brand awareness, leads, and sales.
Main header on Assistagram’s front page
This doesn’t make any sense. What does it mean for an agency to have “a network of 220 million Instagram followers”? Can someone please explain that? There’s a lot of social media experience on our team here and we can’t decipher what is meant by this or why an agency would claim this.
Next, we have the classic “bar of lies”:
Except, amazingly, these articles are real–Assistagram paid for the placements! Yes, you can do that. All the other services we review just lie about their non-existent features. Here is the Forbes article that they paid for.
The claim from the 2018 Forbes article was that in one picture the founder was “drinking tea while traveling in Bali and running his seven-figure business.” Since, back in 2018, that was how everyone who was full of shit talked, it leaves me suspicious of the founder.
Is this someone I want to trust with my money or my Instagram account? No. Is this someone a fake influencer would be likely to pay? Absolutely.
Even though all of these articles are extremely generic and all seem to be paid placements, you can view more of them on the founder’s personal website.
As you would expect, the website doesn’t have an active Trustpilot page because it doesn’t have all that many customers. It’s a different type of service. However, the website does contain some fake, cheap-actor “influencer testimonials.” I’m not even going to link it. Just look at the picture.
The website itself hasn’t been updated seemingly since we first viewed it several years ago. The blog hasn’t been updated since 2019.
When you click the Instagram link on the website it just sends you to the owner’s Instagram. Thanks to his paid news article placements, he has a blue check on Instagram. He is now known as the “Maldives Mastermind.”
You can’t make this shit up. Not somebody I want to pay to manage my social media profiles. But this begs the question …
How funny would it be if behind this facade, this guy was just running follow-unfollow bots on your account to grow your Instagram? The site’s blog stopped updating right around when the last large Instagram change was, so your guess is as good as mine.
Conclusion
Overall, this is a bizarre service that seems bespoke but is shrouded in secrecy behind the founder’s cult of personality. Until we see some real results or proof of what they’re doing, we have a hard time recommending this service to anyone.
Sunday Morning Marketing is a totally legitimate marketing agency in Boston that used to offer an Instagram growth service. Since that link is now dead, we must assume that they no longer offer the service.
This service was by request only, and so we don’t know what they were charging. Sometimes agencies like this will white label other services and simply charge as much as they can get away with. That’s likely what was happening here. You don’t become an unmatched Instagram growth service overnight unless you’re just selling someone else’s service.
Service Details
Ultimately, we don’t know what was going on here. They said that they were only accepting 10 clients total into this program, which is something we respect. Here is the cached version of the webpage.
Besides our consistent and unmatched results, we are real people that care about your account. We don’t use bots or automated systems. We are available around the clock for your specific needs.
One special aspect about this service is that we only accept 10 clients per month. This allows us to give you the attention your account deserves.
Sounds a little fishy to me. Show me the consistent and unmatched results! How much is a US-based service charging to actually be available around the clock?
Integrity & Reputation
Why does everyone do this? If you see a featured page and can’t back it up with a basic Google search or backlink, it’s fraudulent. Now it’s actually possible that some things this agency has produced have been featured on these programs, but that’s not the same as the agency being seen on these networks.
Conclusion
This service was unique in that it was a new offering by an established small marketing agency. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like it worked out. There is no other information on the internet for us to cross-reference.
If we’re rating websites based on names, BabbleHub gets an F.
The service has been around for many years but the website doesn’t seem like it’s been updated since launch. There is some transparency to the business in that it’s real and registered in the UK but the prices are awful and the website is filled with fake testimony.
These are very expensive prices for what is obviously a basic SaaS offering. Most likely, the single owner is running your account in Jarvee or a similar service.
Service Details
The offerings are pretty basic and correspond to whatever switches the owner might be flipping in whatever growth software he’s using.
Based on the branding of the site and the complete lack of team transparency, it’s likely that it is indeed based in the UK but is comprised of a team of people for whom English is not their first language. The support offering for this service will range from bad to non-existent.
Integrity & Reputation
These are some big claims. With research I discovered that the testimony they received from BMW was actually from a local sales manager in some corner of the United Kingdom. I’m imagining the other endorsements fall under a similar explanation.
When there’s no Trustpilot and no “reviews” even on the spammy review sites, you know that a service isn’t popular and probably isn’t worth your time to check out. When it comes to BabbleHub, my guess would be that the name is so stupid that many people simply never considered it being a real business.
Conclusion
There is no reason to completely write off BabbleHub, aside for the name and the UK-centric pricing (and, presumably, hours). However, this should be treated primarily as a local service for those located close to headquarters. It is a good fit for those who may take advantage of other, higher-value agency-style offerings from this provider.
Polished Agency only roused my suspicions because the name doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. It struck me as an obvious case of a business created by a shady overseas provider.
However, in reviewing the website and dispelling the common “red flags,” this seems like a totally legitimate marketing agency built around a human-managed Instagram growth service. Since there’s no subscription model and they don’t post pricing on the website, it’s definitely not a scam.
For the record, services like this don’t fit well into our review criteria, but I think it’s useful to highlight a service that is conducting business in an honest way.
Pricing is by request only and this is a no-commitment non-subscription service. This significantly builds trust because you must correspond with a human in order to sign up. There is no chance you’d just be tossing your money into a black hole here.
Service Details
Sounds great! The only bad news here is that their claims may be a little inflated. Guaranteeing “loyal fans” is outrageous. It just doesn’t happen even if you’re customizing every interaction.
Further, there’s no guarantee that the growth/engagement aspects of this aren’t simply outsourced to a SaaS service. Because this offering is bespoke, it’s impossible to tell. But you can be guaranteed that they don’t have a person sitting there clicking all day like Ampfluence does.
Integrity & Reputation
This is a full-service agency. The team is verifiable and the business has an office location and a phone that works. Due to the way the website is structured, you can rest assured that this isn’t a high-volume scam business.
The business provides believable case studies and on-site testimonials (which I usually ignore).
Conclusion
If you have a large budget, a service like this can be great for you. You should always prioritize content quality over raw follower numbers. You’ll just never truly have the peace of mind in knowing exactly how they’re growing your account.
Everzocial has an identifiable team but it seems the website has fallen into a state of disrepair. It doesn’t appear to still be possible to sign up for their Instagram growth service.
Unknown pricing. However, they offer a fully-managed Instagram service for $600 per month. They also offer website design services.
Service Details
We suspect this was a basic SaaS Instagram growth service which they bolted on to their existing offerings.
Integrity & Reputation
They claim to have won some awards between 3-5 years ago, but none of these were verifiable. However, the website has been around for almost a decade.
There are some old reviews on Bark. They seem to be somewhat legitimate, though not based on experiences with the Instagram service.
I warn that the language used in these reviews seems more akin to marketing copy written by the business owners on behalf of clients, but there aren’t so many reviews that this could be a major concern.
Hitting the minimum word count but essentially saying nothing
Conclusion
This service doesn’t appear to still be operating. Further, Instagram growth wasn’t their specialty.
A1 Republic, though it sounds like the name was conceived in a fraternity basement, the company is a unique fully-featured social media agency that specializes in software solutions.
See Service Details section for pricing. Our opinion is that the offerings are diverse enough for there not to be much of a benchmark for the price.
Service Details
Am I ever going to look at an ugly Squarespace website like this one and then turn around and hire you to design a website for me? Hell no.
Other than that, there are a ton of services here: Instagram Growth, Youtube Growth, Tiktok Growth, Facebook Ads, and Google Ranking.
We care most about Instagram so that’s what we’ll focus on.
This is different from the traditional SaaS offering. Do Loop Giveaways work? Yes–but they’re not being forthcoming about how many followers you’ll lose, so that’s a red flag.
Instagram Ad service, that’s actually a great idea and since you see the product, there’s a very low chance of getting scammed.
Real Auto Likes / Real Auto Comments for $80/$100 per month? It’s an oxymoron through and through. If they’re real, they can’t be auto. Engagement groups, generally, are not “real,” they’re super spammy and the actions don’t stick.
Manual IG Growth can be tricky, and at $250 per month, I’d prefer Ampfluence. But you never know.
MSV — we’ve asked around and we actually don’t know what this is. Regardless, it’s for verified accounts only.
This is a diverse enough offering that something might work. We’re willing to give them the benefit of the doubt here and say that some of these services might be worth a try.
Integrity & Reputation
The business doesn’t have any active content or independent reviews. The team is identifiable which builds trust significantly. They might be a good choice, but they’re unproven at this point. A single bad review would bring this service to the C tier.
Conclusion
A1 Republic is a unique service with an awful name and website that just might have one of the most diverse service offerings in the industry. I’d recommend contacting this business before buying any services.
