These Love Island Contestants Have Thousands of Fake Followers

Not even four weeks into Season Five of Love Island and the Islanders are, as expected, turning out to be faker than their tans.

And we’re not refering to their relationships or personalitite.

Takumi, an Instagram marketing service, has revealed that over half of the contestants’ collective followers on Instagram are fake.

Yikes.

The average follower count of the 17 contestants ranges from 30,000 to 1,000,000 but only one of them seems to have a (slight) majority of genuine followers.

Maura Higgins (@maurahiggins) is the islander with the most engagement, boasting a ratio of 55:45 real to fake followers. Amber Rose Gill (@amberrosegill) and Jordan Hames (@jxrdanhames) have the highest concentration of fake followers, with an astonishing 65% each of fake profiles following their accounts.

The service has also revealed Tommy Fury’s 1.1 million followers (the highest of all the Islanders) is mostly fake; apparently only 400,000 followers are from genuine accounts.

And while contestant Anton Danyluk (@anton_danyluk) appears to be extremely popular on the ‘gram with users from India, Mexico and Brazil, Campaign Live has made it clear these countries are common locations for bot farms (i.e. hotspots for fake followers).

Curious to know more? Here’s how the Love Island contestants are ranked via percentage of fake followers on Instagram…

1. Amber Rose Gill – 621, 000 – 65% fake

2. Jordan Hames – 53, 800 – 65% fake

3. Joe Garratt – 458, 000 – 64% fake

4. Yewande Biala  – 410, 000 – 64% fake

5. Michael Griffiths  – 545, 000 – 63% fake

6. Callum McLeod – 262, 000 – 62% fake

7. Tommy Fury– 1, 000, 000 – 60% fake

8. Danny Williams  – 165, 000 – 59% fake

9. Amy Hart– 480, 000 – 59% fake

10. Elma Pazar– 116, 000 – 58% fake

11. Lucie Rose Donlan– 933, 000 – 56% fake

12. Anna Vakili– 554, 000 – 53% fake

13. Molly Mae Hague– 863, 000 – 53% fake

14. Anton Danyluk – 395, 000 – 52% fake

15. Curtis Pritchard – 640, 000 – 52% fake

16. Tom Walker – 47, 100 – 50% fake

17. Maura Higgins – 358, 000 – 45% fake

Many of the contestants have promoted products and/or services within their feed and landed brand deals well before they auditioned for the show. 

This just goes to show how marketers and brands need to be vigilant in auditing digital talent, before working with them on campaigns. 

Recent findings show that brands spent over 200 million (approx. 734.63 dirhams) dollars working with influencers who had fake followings and were committing influencer fraud.

We wonder how this will affect the Islanders going forward, especially when it comes to snagging those coveted brand deals and sponsorships after they’re voted off the island.

Guess we’ll have to wait and see…

What are your thoughts? Let us know in the comments below.

Written by Anushé Samee