Prince William, Kate Middleton Cheating to Beat Prince Harry, Meghan Markle on Instagram?
All eyes are on the Fab Four since amid the many scandals and bombshells rocking the British monarchy.
Early this week, social media analysts believe that Prince William and Kate Middleton are using bots to cheat on Instagram.
According to a report by The New York Times, social media experts have dissected the two Instagram accounts -- one owned by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, @KensingtonRoyal, and the other owned by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, @SussexRoyal.
The social media experts were trying to figure out why Prince Harry and Meghan Markle fail to "overtake" the Cambridges' followers despite their soaring popularity. They believe that the Sussexes should have been ahead already as they mark their return to the U.K. after stepping down as full-time royals last January.
"Data generated by the media monitoring software Cision, which tracks online media mentions, found that, from the date of the announcement of Harry and Meghan's engagement in November 2017 to January 20202, Harry and Meghan received vastly more global online attention than did William and Kate," the report said.
The trend continues in Google searches, which shows that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are more popular than the Kensington Royals.
This led analysts to believe that the older couple had likely resorted to bot followers.
The article stated facts that Prince Harry and Meghan achieved higher engagements than the Cambridges. It is also unusual, according to the analysts, that Prince William and Kate's account gained followers despite not posting any content.
Currently, @KensingtonRoyal and @SussexRoyal show 11.2 million followers each.
In the follower category, @KensingtonRoyal takes the lead with 11,280,343 and counting, while @SussexRoyal is at 11,269,129 Instagram followers.
But last month, @KensingtonRoyal ended with a 2.21 percent engagement rate, while @SussexRoyal ended the month with a 6.54 percent engagement rate.
@SussexRoyal also has more likes -- 14 million -- than @KensingtonRoyal.
However, it is not just "likes" for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex to take the lead. They also have substantially more comments than their counterparts.
According to the report, "Harry and Meghan won comments by an even bigger margin: in the same time frame, their account received more than double the number of comments that @KensingtonRoyal did."
They also mentioned that the younger prince and his former actress wife might even have more followers and engagements due to negative feedback or hate following.
Other social media experts believe that both couples may be using growth strategies and campaigns to inflate the number of their followers and their engagements.
Ever since Prince Harry and Meghan Markle split from Prince William and Kate Middleton, they created @SussexRoyal and took the "Insta Crown."
But having higher engagements and following did not happen back when they opened their separate account or when Prince Archie was born. The only time both couples came close to their Instagram was when the Sussexes stepped down as senior royals in January 2020.
The Sussexes' following did overtake the Cambridges', but a month later, after posting pictures on their feed of their charity work, @KensingtonRoyal has regained its follower lead.
They established that while there are unpredictable factors, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge could be receiving follower bots to make sure the monarchial hierarchy of Prince William being more important than Prince Harry is maintained.
Spokespeople for both royal houses denied the allegations that their social media teams manipulated their follower numbers.
If this is true, Prince William and Kate Middleton's account could be blocked and they would be banned on the platform altogether because it violates Instagram's policy.
