Social media platforms are hands-down the best way to promote yourself, with billions of users who may be potentially interested in what you want to share.
It’s no wonder that brands, influencers, and businesses of all sizes build their marketing around Instagram and similar networks.
However, accomplishing all of your Instagram marketing goals is easier said than done.
You need to post regularly, track analytics, and reach out to people who are genuinely into your content. And to say that competition is stiff would be an understatement.
Luckily, there are many tools that can help you with this time-consuming process. More and more seem to be popping every day.
As usual, I spend hours upon hours researching and trying out various Instagram marketing tools to discover those that actually work.
Next up is Instaheap. You may or may not know this, but Instaheap shut down. Why? Should you be worried if you used it in the past? Are there any better alternatives?
Keep scrolling down this Instaheap review to find out!
What Is Instaheap?
Instaheap was an Instagram bot, but it has been shut down for a while. From what I’ve seen, it doesn’t work since 2018.
There are some allegations that it was canceled around the same time when Instagram and Facebook sued a bunch of Instagram bots for violating their terms.
So, is it a rule of thumb that Instagram bots go against Instagram’s policy and get demised?
Not always.
Although human-powered growth is preferred if you want to grow your account the right way, there are some bots that still work. They are usually discreet and interact with real people to avoid getting you banned.
That said, Instaheap definitely was not one of them.
They no longer accept clients, and their official website is down. According to reviews on reputable websites such as Trustpilot.com, Instaheap kept charging their customers even after their services stopped working.
They did not respond to emails. Their Twitter account was last active in 2017. Even though it isn’t running anymore, it helped me get a deeper insight into the tool while it still worked.
Apart from that, their automation practices seem to have been too aggressive, which resulted in a ban of your account, or your actions getting blocked.
Let’s see what else has led to the Instaheap downfall.
Top Instaheap Alternatives
| Service | Rating | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Flock Social | 4.8 | Check Price |
| Upleap.com | 4.6 | Check Price |
| Nitreo.com | 4.3 | Check Price |
| SocialFollow | 4.2 | Check Price |
| KENJI.AI | 4 | Check Price |
| Stim Social | 3.9 | Check Price |
How Does Instaheap Work?
Instaheap does not work anymore, so I can only try and reconstruct how it had worked before the shutdown.
It was a classic Instagram bot that liked and followed other users so that they would follow you back. You were supposed to enter some filters, and it should find the target audience.
Based on reviews of people who had tried it before it got canceled, it would stop working after a few days. And if you somehow got it to work, your account would be banned because of aggressive automation. Some users even lost their accounts for longer than a month.
Others were logged out of the tool even though they had an active subscription, and they got a message “invalid password.” They weren’t able to reset it, and Instaheap customer service did not respond in any way (of course, they had claimed you’d get a response within 24 hours).
Popular reviews you should also read:
- Nitreo Review: Is It Really One Of The Best Instagram Growth Services?
- Upleap Review: Is It Safe To Grow Your Instagram Faster?
- Kenji Instagram Review – Is It Legit? All You Need to Know
Instaheap Features
Based on a couple of Instaheap reviews, here is what Instaheap offered:
Machine Learning Approach
They claimed to use a sort of Artificial Intelligence to scan your account and Instagram’s algorithm and get the best results.
Do you believe that this is true? I don’t.
The bot was not that advanced, and it’s highly unlikely they optimized the performance according to this approach. It would require a much more developed tool to achieve this.
So – just like the rest of the former Instaheap marketing campaign – it was a bunch of buzzwords.
Audience Targeting
Instaheap asked you to specify your niche by entering hashtags. Supposedly, they would use these filters to engage with potential followers and thus bring them to your profile.
Yeah, you guessed it – they didn’t interact with target accounts. It was completely random.
Automated Activity
Instagram bots can use a variety of Instagram tasks to interact with other users. The basic ones use likes and follows or unfollows, while more advanced ones also perform commenting, story viewing, and sending DMs.
It seems that Instaheap utilized only the basic features. So, it liked and followed other IG accounts on your behalf.
The problem was that they did so with fake users and bot accounts. Even if they came to your profile, they would get deleted soon after.
And of course, Instagram strongly disapproves of such practices. Therefore, they would ban your account temporarily or put a block on your activities so that you couldn’t interact with other users at all.
Pricing of Instaheap
There’s not enough evidence to trace back Instaheap’s tariff plans.
In any case, even if it had been cheap, the fact that they charged people after they canceled the subscription and refused to reimburse the money means that it ended up costing you much more than the price tag.
From what I learned on their Twitter account, it seems that they had a free 3-day trial. I believe that three days is the longest period they could go without Instagram noticing the suspicious activity.
Is Instaheap Legit?
Since Instaheap is down, it’s unnecessary to dwell too much on this – no, it wasn’t legit, and that’s why they canceled it.
All the evidence pointed to a scam.
The company didn’t provide customer support, even though they promised to respond within 24 hours. They refused to cancel recurring payments and stole money from people. This is confirmed by multiple reviews on websites like Trustpilot.com and Scampulse.com.
I think that the only way you could have canceled your Instaheap subscription was to deactivate your payment method, which equals fraudulence.
In an ideal scenario, all the tools similar to Instaheap would get canceled.
Is Instaheap Safe?
Again, if it was safe, it would be still on.
Instaheap presented a threat to your account because it could get you suspended or your actions blocked.
Plus, their website was listed as suspicious, which means they could steal some of your info.
Not to mention that they stole their customers’ money.
So, yeah, definitely not safe.
PROS and CONS
| PROS | CONS |
|---|---|
| Was easy to set up | Stopped working |
| Got canceled | |
| Aggressive automation | |
| Put your account at risk | |
| Unresponsive customer support | |
| Refused to issue refunds | |
| Overcharged people |
Instaheap Review: Final Verdict
Without the right tools to boost your follower count, your Instagram marketing can fall flat before you get a chance to create and post quality content.
Even before Instaheap shut down, it definitely was not a game-changer. It was just a regular Instagram bot that interacted with fake people. It’s no wonder they canceled it.
If you want to approach your strategy with full-force, organic reach is the key. Refer to the table above for some Instagram management tools that bring you real and targeted followers.
Top 10 Instagram Bots
Looking for Instaheap alternatives that actually work? We have compiled a list of the best organic growth services available down below!
| Service | Rating | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Flock Social | 4.8 | Check Price |
| Upleap.com | 4.6 | Check Price |
| Nitreo.com | 4.3 | Check Price |
| SocialFollow | 4.2 | Check Price |
| KENJI.AI | 4 | Check Price |
| Stim Social | 3.9 | Check Price |