Methodology

All W.A.L.S.H. Pulse data is human verified and collected from free, public sources. We do not scrape Instagram, we do not purchase data from third-party providers, and we do not use proprietary API access. Every data point can be independently verified by anyone with an Instagram account.

Each tracked athlete's verified Instagram profile is reviewed weekly by our research team. Post-level data (post date, post type, caption, tags, likes, comments, shares, reposts, follower count) is captured, human verified, and stored in our database. Calculations are applied automatically against locked methodology weights.

We track only verified Instagram accounts. Athletes without verified accounts are not included in our database.

W.A.L.S.H. Pulse curates athlete pools by sport and position. Inclusion in a pool is based on Instagram follower count among verified accounts within that sport or position group, with rankings refreshed monthly. Pools are publicly visible in our Rankings section so users can see who is currently included and how athletes compare within their competitive tier.

Pro tier dashboards display engagement metrics for the last 10 non-pinned chronological posts on each athlete's verified Instagram account.

Pro Plus tier dashboards display engagement metrics for the full historical archive of an athlete's posts, calculated against multiple time windows (7 days, 14 days, 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, 6 months, 1 year, all-time).

Hidden likes count as zero, not excluded. Posts with comments disabled count as zero comments, not excluded. Data absence is scored at zero; posts are not removed from the sample.

Engagement Rate for any individual post is calculated as:

(likes + comments + shares + reposts) ÷ followers × 100

Each track ER (Self ER, Sponsor ER, Institutional ER) is the average ER across all posts within that track in the sample window.

Self ER measures average engagement per post on content the athlete creates and publishes themselves. This is organic audience strength with no external amplification.

Sponsor ER measures average engagement per post on content tagged with brand partners or sponsor handles, or where the post is a sponsored collaboration. This shows how audiences respond when commercial partnerships are involved.

Institutional ER measures average engagement per post that tags school, conference, agency, league, program, or official organization accounts. This measures reach generated outside the athlete's direct control.

Posts are human verified and classified into one and only one track. Posts that could fit multiple categories are classified by primary tag context.

WAER is W.A.L.S.H. Pulse's headline metric. It blends three engagement tracks (Self, Sponsor, Institutional) into one auditable score that measures total audience responsiveness across all post types.

If an athlete has no posts in one or more tracks during the sample window, the missing tracks are redistributed proportionally across the remaining tracks. Weights are not adjusted based on athlete profile, sport, or any editorial judgment.

WAER weights the three tracks as follows: Self ER 50 percent, Sponsor ER 25 percent, Institutional ER 25 percent. The Self track receives double weight because it represents the athlete's organic audience response, which is the most reliable signal of audience strength. Sponsor and Institutional tracks receive equal weight at 25 percent each because both reflect external amplification rather than direct audience-athlete connection.

Worked example. An athlete with posts in only Self and Sponsor tracks during the sample window has the Institutional weight redistributed across the two tracks with data. The math: Self 0.50 divided by 0.75 equals 0.667. Sponsor 0.25 divided by 0.75 equals 0.333. The athlete's WAER becomes Self ER weighted at 66.7 percent and Sponsor ER weighted at 33.3 percent. The same redistribution logic applies for any combination of present and absent tracks. If only one track has posts, that track's weight redistributes to 100 percent.

W.A.L.S.H. Pulse leaderboards rank athletes by a composite score that combines two inputs: WAER and Instagram follower count. Both inputs are converted to percentile ranks within the pool, then averaged equally to produce the composite score that determines leaderboard rank.

Step one. For every eligible athlete in the pool, the system calculates a follower percentile (where the athlete sits relative to all other eligible athletes in the pool by follower count) and a WAER percentile (where the athlete sits by WAER value). The athlete with the lowest value is at the 0th percentile and the athlete with the highest value is at the 100th percentile, with all other athletes scaled between.

Step two. The composite score is the simple average of the two percentile ranks. An athlete at the 80th percentile in followers and the 40th percentile in WAER produces a composite score of 60. The composite score is calculated to one decimal place.

Step three. Athletes are sorted by composite score from highest to lowest, and rank numbers are assigned accordingly. If two athletes have identical composite scores, the tie is broken by raw WAER value, with the higher WAER ranking first.

Step four. Each athlete is assigned to a tier band based on their composite score percentile within the pool. Magnetic for the top 20 percent, Highly Connected for the next 20 percent, Actively Engaged for the middle 20 percent, Moderately Connected for the next 20 percent, Passive Presence for the bottom 20 percent.

Pool-relative percentiles. Percentile ranks are always calculated within the specific pool or filtered sub-pool. When you switch the Offensive Players page from All to Skill or Trenches, the percentiles recalculate within only the filtered athletes. This means an athlete's percentile and tier can change when a filter is applied, even though the underlying follower count and WAER values do not change.

Eligibility threshold. To enter a composite ranking, an athlete must have at least 10 lifetime Instagram posts in the W.A.L.S.H. Pulse database. Athletes below this threshold are excluded from the ranking and do not appear on the leaderboard. The threshold ensures every ranked athlete has a meaningful baseline of activity behind their score.

Tier names appear in two contexts in W.A.L.S.H. Pulse. On the leaderboard, the tier names (Magnetic, Highly Connected, Actively Engaged, Moderately Connected, Passive Presence) reflect composite score percentile within the pool, as described in the Composite Ranking section above. On individual athlete cards, the same tier names reflect raw engagement rate values within each of the three tracks (Self, Sponsor, Institutional). The thresholds below apply only to the per-track ER values shown on athlete cards. The leaderboard tiers use percentile bands (top 20 percent, next 20 percent, etc.) rather than absolute ER thresholds.

Each ER score maps to a tier label for quick interpretation. Tier names are consistent across all three tracks; only the numeric thresholds differ.

Athlete (Self) ER

• Exceptional: 45.1% or higher
• Responsive: 27.3% to 45.0%
• Moderate: 17.2% to 27.2%
• Weak: 1.0% to 17.1%
• Negligible: under 1%

Sponsor ER

• Exceptional: 25% or higher
• Responsive: 10% to 24.99%
• Moderate: 3% to 9.99%
• Weak: 1% to 2.99%
• Negligible: under 1%

Institutional ER

Same thresholds as Sponsor ER.

Tier thresholds are locked and applied consistently across all athletes regardless of sport or follower tier.

For Pro Plus historical trend visualizations, engagement rate is calculated against the athlete's current follower count for cross-period comparability. Because follower counts change over time, the engagement rate metric on older posts is normalized to the current follower base and may understate the engagement rate at the time of original publication.

For the most accurate measure of historical post performance, refer to absolute engagement actions (raw counts of likes, comments, shares, and reposts), which require no follower normalization and are displayed alongside normalized ER on all Pro Plus historical views.

For any athlete with three or more sponsor posts in the sample window, W.A.L.S.H. Pulse identifies the highest-performing sponsored post as the Sponsor Spotlight. The Spotlight displays the brand partner, post date, total engagement actions, and a multiplier comparing the post's engagement rate to the athlete's average Sponsor ER.

Athletes with fewer than three sponsor posts in the sample window do not display a Sponsor Spotlight.

W.A.L.S.H. Pulse data is human verified and updated weekly. Weekly cadence keeps the methodology stable and the data quality high. Real-time feeds optimize for volatility; commercial decisions need a defensible signal you can stand behind in a brief or a contract.

We do not produce a single valuation number. W.A.L.S.H. Pulse is engagement analytics, not a black-box dollar valuation. Buyers use W.A.L.S.H. Pulse data as one input into their own commercial decisions.

We do not adjust scores based on athlete name recognition, legacy, or editorial judgment. Weights are locked and applied uniformly.

We do not include data from non-verified Instagram accounts.

We do not include data from any platform other than Instagram. W.A.L.S.H. Pulse is purpose-built for Instagram analytics.

If you identify what you believe is a data error in any Walsh Pulse score, contact us at support@walshpulse.com with the specific athlete, post, and metric in question. We review every reported issue and publicly correct any confirmed errors.

This methodology document is version 1.0, effective July 2026. Methodology changes are versioned and documented. Historical data is recalculated when methodology changes affect comparability across time periods.