8 ms·
No, Your Instagram ‘Influence’ Is Not as Good as Cash, Club Owner Says
- duderific 8y ago> “We found this disrespectful,” he said in an interview Monday night. It didn’t help that often the “influencers” had fewer than 2,000 Instagram followers. “How can you help me if you are no one?” he asked. Burn!
- justboxing 8y ago> We are receiving many messages regarding collaborations with influencers, Instagram influencers. We kindly would like to announce that White Banana is not interested to “collaborate” with self-proclaimed “influencers.” And we would like to suggest to try another way to eat, drink, or sleep for free. > Or try to actually work. Love this quote from the Owner.
- kylek 8y ago"Influencers" (what a crock of a term, by the way) who try to do this are essentially beggars and/or fraudsters, who likely needs to get his/her ego in check.
- kelnos 8y agoI wish we'd call them what they actually are: "freelance marketers".
- reaperducer 8y agoReminds me of people who steal other people photographs and use them for their own projects. "Oh, but I'm giving you exposure!" What makes you think I want your exposure? I know nothing about you or your blog. What if I don't agree with what you publish? Get out of your mom's basement and go take your own photos.
- siruncledrew 8y agoThere's plenty of douchebags that think 'because it's the internet' that gives free range to be a shitty person.
- reidjs 8y agoI don’t see the harm in the “influencers” asking. For some places it’s probably worth it to get the cheap promotion.
- sillyquiet 8y agoThe harm is not so much in the ask but in the existence of such 'influencers' to begin with. It's revolting in a regressive, quasi-aristocratic kind of way.
- mfoy_ 8y agoIt really is, these people could also threaten to use their influence to smear places as well. So small business owners may feel the need to kowtow to the influencers' demands. Very much akin to: "Oh! You're the duke's nephew? Dinner is on the house, of course!"
- DannyB2 8y agoFrom TFA... > resorts in the Maldives were swamped with influencer inquiries > has faced such an overwhelming number of inquiries from “influencers” over the past six months that the hotel has stopped working with them It's like saying you don't see the harm in email spam.
- my_usernam3 8y agoI think it's just frustrating to business owners. Running one and maintaining profitability can be hard for small business owners. Profit margins are already really small in the service industry. So imagine you run one of these establishments, and you're constantly bombarded with entitled kids with instagram accounts asking for free stuff. I'm not saying its a major issue, but I would be pretty ticked off myself if this happened.
- pedasmith 8y agoIndeed -- Tesla lived for free for years in a New York hotel. The hotel owners felt that his mere presence made the entire building a nicer place.
- lordnacho 8y agoI wonder how many people are making an Instagram profile, buying a load of followers, and using that to get freebies. Is it easy to know if someone has a legit highly followed account?
- dewey 8y agoThey do, and it’s possible. There are a bunch of tools to detect fake followers like on Twitter.
- hammock 8y agoThese influencers should try the club promoters, not the club owners. They will find more success.
- hopler 8y agoThe club promoters are real influencers.
- reaperducer 8y agoYep. There are companies that recruit young, attractive woman in Los Angeles and then bus them en masse to Las Vegas to simply exist in certain clubs. I know they get paid for their time, plus the free bus ride, plus free club admission. I don't know if they get to eat and drink for free, or if they stay overnight, or if they are just bused back to L.A. at 6am.
- DannyB2 8y agoSome people say there is no harm in the "influencers" asking. From TFA... > resorts in the Maldives were swamped with influencer inquiries > has faced such an overwhelming number of inquiries from “influencers” over the past six months that the hotel has stopped working with them It's like saying you don't see the harm in email spam.
- mfoy_ 8y agoYeah it's a pretty self-absorbed thing to do (and say). Like, there's no harm if the outcome is mutually beneficial... but you just have to know deep down that posting one picture of a beach out front of a resort for your 2,000 followers to see is not going to generate a worthwhile amount of interest in the resort in reality... But I think most "influencers" are completely deluded anyways, so maybe they really do believe that posting a couple vacation photos is of equivalent worth to the vacation itself... It's like people who approach photographers and request that they work for free to "build their portfolio".
- DannyB2 8y agoThat last line is a good one. How about the 'influencers' work for free to build up more followers. If you spend your own money to go on vacations and post videos / pictures, then you will get followers.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- ozim 8y agoI would make auto reply with link to Dunning-Kruger effect on Wikipedia.
- xiphias2 8y agoThe owner looks like an asshole as well. This is not luxury for me (that word is written in the name of the place on booking.com): https://q-ak.bstatic.com/images/hotel/max1280x900/183/183046719.jpg https://q-ak.bstatic.com/images/hotel/max1280x900/183/183046...
- toomuchtodo 8y ago> The owner looks like an asshole as well. Personal attacks are not cool.
- xiphias2 8y agoI'm sorry about that, I didn't mean to offend anybody, but here it looks to me that the owner is making money from lying to people. I'm travelling a lot and I got sometimes surprised by how much worse a place was in reality than from the first impression on Booking.com. I should have explained myself nicer.
- dontbenebby 8y agoFor the same price in Europe you'd be in a 10-20 person dorm. That's a good deal for a beach resort.
- dustindiamond 8y agoAre there companies that will ‘aggregate’ microinfluencers for advertisers?
- devmunchies 8y agoThat sounds like cohort targeting, like Stripe going after developers.
- cosmie 8y agoSomething like Socialbakers? https://www.socialbakers.com/feature/influencer-marketing https://www.socialbakers.com/feature/influencer-marketing
- jedberg 8y agoI've sort of wondered how this whole influencer thing actually works. There was a girl I ran across on Instagram (friend of a friend) who appears to have no job other than posing in her swimsuit at exotic resorts (sometimes with her boyfriend and sometimes with other women in bathing suits). She only has about 12,000 followers. Do people pay for her to come to those resorts? Is she just not posting anything about her real life on Instagram to make it look like she doesn't work? Is 12,000 followers really a lot?
- yardie 8y agoI've got it on good authority that most Instagram "models" are actually escorts. As one finance asshole I met at a bar so eloquently said, "we flew them out to Dubai, degraded them and destroyed them." The only Instagram professional I know is a social marketing consultant. Spends more time behind the camera than in front of it.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- repomies68 8y agoMaybe she does also some gigs on the side, such as a escorting.
- alistairSH 8y agoMy take... For most "influencers" it's just a hobby. They just like posting pictures of themselves in cool places. Maybe they have a monetization plan, maybe not. Either way, they make/made their money elsewhere.[0] For a few, they're the modern equivalent of niche hobby and fashion magazines[1]. They publish some free content on Instagram or Youtube, maybe get some ad revenue, but also publish premium content on a subscription model, or have actual business arrangements with companies. But, they're working hard to do what they do. EDIT - I didn't really address the original question, which was about one specific woman. I have no idea. I doubt she's being paid by resort owners. Either she has money, friends with money, or she's an escort. Or maybe something else I can't think of. 0 - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4SXMZsFPZMFN5-3UuF-k6w https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4SXMZsFPZMFN5-3UuF-k6w Trent Palmer does a lot of airplane stuff, but earns his living shooting drone footage for movies and commercials. 1 - https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/the-lonely-life-of-a-yacht-influencer https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/the-lonely-life-of-a-yac... Alex Jimenez has business relationships with yacht brokers and gets paid to generate content in order to drive clients to lease/buy mega-yachts.
- dontbenebby 8y agoWhy can't these people just do couchsurfing if they want free lodging? (Oh yeah, I forgot: it's considered polite to take your host out to dinner, or at least a beer, and these people want to simply vacation for free, not travel.)
- jawns 8y agoI think a lot of people find the word "influencer" to be, for the most part, aspirational puffery, especially if preceded by "self-described." But the actual phenomenon is really very interesting. Brands used to primarily rely on in-house marketing teams or external marketing agencies, who might try to get their products in the hands of people with strong platforms, aka the ability to market to lots of people by virtue of their fame, reach, etc. Now you have a lot of what might be called freelance lifestyle marketers. They're like a copy of InStyle magazine, where the editorial content is themselves and the lux life they (purportedly) lead, and the advertising content is the products they market. I think a lot of the consternation about social media influencers is because it's a new marketing avenue with fairly little gatekeeping. Someone with 4,000 Instagram followers and someone with 4 million Instagram followers might both present themselves as influencers, and it's hard to tell who's legit. It's especially hard for smaller businesses, such as an independent hotel or bar, because who has the time to research all of these claims? What I think we're already starting to see is that some of the people with the largest followings, who legitimately can be called influencers, are being approached by agencies who represent them, because then the agencies are doing the gatekeeping.
- travisjungroth 8y ago> Someone with 4,000 Instagram followers and someone with 4 million Instagram followers might both present themselves as influencers, and it's hard to tell who's legit. One of these is roughly a thousand times more valuable than the other, but we often talk about them as if they're the same. You can keep your sanity by realizing that anyone that is trying to barter for your services with exposure is not a buyer, they're a seller. You can estimate the dollar value of the exposure they're offering, compare it to the asking price of what they want, and either do the deal or not. I think where feelings get hurt is the price/value of the exposure they're selling is so horrible that feelings get hurt or it feels like a scam. What's a post to a thousand followers worth? A few cents, a few dollars? Nothing close to the $300 of food and accommodation they might ask for it.
- chrisseaton 8y ago> One of these is roughly a thousand times more valuable than the other Is 4 million people who aren't your target market really a thousand times more valuable than 4 thousand who are exactly your target market? > What's a post to a thousand followers worth? A few cents, a few dollars? Nothing close to the $300 of food and accommodation they might ask for it. Again, a post to a thousand followers who are exactly your target market, already looking to spend a significant sum of money, and who will take the influencer's recommendation extremely seriously, could be worth far more than $300.
- jaclaz 8y agoAs a side note, if these influencers exist (and the actually largely followed ones seem to make a lot of real money, besides the free stuff they are offered) it means that there are huge numbers of influenced, and that presumably these people - one way or the other - actually "pay the bill". Otherwise all firms/hotels/restaurants/whatever that actually - unlike Mr. Casaccia - accept the "begging" are not capable of evaluating properly the increase in revenue that the influencers allegedly cause. Both the possibilities (huge numbers of gullible people or huge numbers of clueless managers) seem to me like not good news.
- Beldin 8y agoThis got me wondering: if people are suggesting to trade posts for a free stay or meal, they must believe that their posts are worth something. So adding value. In case this is not a one-of thing, but the way they travel, then they are basically professionally selling advertisements. Which is subject to value added tax. So should the tax offices of touristy countries start sending bills to influencers?
- HNLurker2 8y agoBypass paywall: https://lm.facebook.com/l.php?u=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/world/philippines-hotel-influencers-social-media.html https://lm.facebook.com/l.php?u=https://www.nytimes.com/2019...