What is this scam of “Engagement farming” that every brand should fear

New Delhi: In a South Delhi housing society, a sweeper earns Rs 6 for every like or comment he posts online. Though his job title says “cleaner,” his real income comes from being part of the shadowy world of engagement farming.

Elsewhere, a watchman claims to be making nearly Rs 30,000 a month simply by liking and commenting on Instagram and YouTube posts.

Welcome to the underbelly of India’s influencer economy, where engagement farming has evolved from a growth hack into a full-blown parallel industry, thriving on artificial likes, hollow comments, and inflated vanity metrics. In today’s hyper-connected content ecosystem, engagement farming isn’t just familiar; it has become foundational.

Kalyan Kumar, Co-founder and CEO of KlugKlug, calls engagement farming a “serious and layered issue” in the influencer ecosystem. “When engagement is artificially inflated with bots, fake likes, views, and comments, it misleads brands, wastes budgets, and harms campaign effectiveness,” he explains. Kumar adds that many influencers already have a significant portion of fake or inactive followers, making it even harder for brands to assess real influence.

But now, the problem has escalated with the rise of AI. A digital marketing agency head, speaking to BuzzInContent.com on condition of anonymity, revealed that he has created over 20 fake Instagram pages for just one client. These aren’t dormant pages; they are AI-powered engagement engines. Each has a dedicated content theme: memes, philosophical quotes, and daily updates, and all content is generated by AI. These fake pages don’t just post; they actively like, comment, and engage with the client’s main account, manufacturing credibility at scale.

This new wave of AI-driven engagement farming is stealthier, cheaper, and far more effective at gaming algorithms and brand perception. For brands unaware of this deception, it builds a façade of influence—glossy on the outside, hollow within. 

Danish Malik, CEO and Founder of Boomlet Group, calls engagement farming a “short-sighted hack” that signals the need for better, more contextual metrics. “This approach isn’t sustainable. Now audiences are more aware, and platforms are getting better at spotting inauthentic engagement,” he says. “Engagement farming highlights a deeper issue: our over-reliance on surface-level metrics to define success. When virality is rewarded more than value, quantity tends to trump quality.”

With performance-linked payouts rising, creators are increasingly drawn to tactics like giveaways, bait captions, outrage posts, and viral challenges. According to Sushant Sadamate, COO and Co-founder of Buzzlab, such tactics are everywhere. “We’ve seen creators boost engagement through prompts like ‘tag three friends’ or ‘comment your favourite movie.’ But scratch the surface, and it’s often hollow. Likes don’t equal loyalty. Comments don’t always convert,” he says. “The spike looks great on reports but rarely moves the needle on actual sales or brand health.”

Sadamate also warned that some agencies are packaging inflated metrics as performance wins, further widening the gap between vanity KPIs and real brand impact. “Engagement farming thrives because we’ve built an ecosystem where vanity metrics still unlock budgets. Algorithms reward noise over nuance. Brands chase follower counts over community depth,” he notes. “It’s a quick fix, not a long game. And it exposes the biggest flaw in today’s digital economy: we’re still measuring what’s easy to count, not what actually counts.”

Kumar also pointed to the fine line between strategy and manipulation. “While gimmicky tactics like ‘comment for a link in DM’ or bait thumbnails do create real interaction, they can lead to dissonance if overused. Followers notice. And they don’t appreciate being played,” he said.

However, not everyone agrees that engagement farming is inherently wrong. Danny Advani, Head of Business Strategy at Dot Media, argues that the creator economy is simply borrowing from traditional digital media playbooks. “The content and media industry has always used templates and clickbait to drive page views. The creator economy is just a new media extension of that. The proof of concept exists—so why not use it?” he asked. 

According to Advani, the real problem isn’t the format, but the lack of substance beneath it. “If your content doesn’t deep dive into a problem or solution, you’ll struggle long-term,” he says, adding that trend-chasing without context and misleading thumbnails are hallmarks of poor-quality engagement.

So, who’s responsible for cleaning up this mess?

Malik believes accountability lies with all stakeholders—platforms, creators, agencies, and brands. “Platforms must use their data and AI tools to detect inorganic engagement. Brands and agencies must move past outdated KPIs and focus on authenticity, audience quality, and long-term impact. And creators must prioritise community over algorithms,” he says. Malik further stresses the need for standardised measurement frameworks that value depth over display.

Advani agreed that not enough is being done and suggested the fundamental flaw lies in how platforms reward content. “They reward what performs, not what informs. For platforms, it’s volume of engagement versus quality of engagement,” he says. “We need a reset and more value-driven metrics like time spent, saves, or shares. With the rise of AI, hopefully the future of credibility won’t be about how loud a post is, but how deeply it resonates.”