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Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

theatlantic.com

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Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#221

Post by lioeters »

wpietri wrote: post #181
fraudsyndrome wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the roll-out of social credit scores in China The thing is, these all aren't enforced by governments, but through social media and organizations. The popular one sesame credit in China is from the Alibaba group, not the Chinese government. In the same vein, Instagram is it's own platform, people can determine how much they think "followers" are worth and businesses can use their own discretion to decide how much to…

Which reminds me of the old joke, "Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's the other way around."

Great quote, apparently by the economist John Kenneth Galbraith.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#222

Post by toomanybeersies »

prawn wrote: post #165
pmorici wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are certainly people with channels that cater to camping or living out of a Jeep / Van. IAmJake for example on YouTube. [0] As evidenced by that I don't think a brand personality has to be luxury but it does have to have a point of view people can take interest in. [0] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbjw-VrJCUb8PTGoiDI2UMw

I've collated a few of these here: https://vanspiration.com/social/ You're right - there are all types. Glamorous, selectively documenting lifestyle types, and others focusing on the craft of it, and others on living that way full time. And there are dozens more trying the same thing all the time, motivated by the earlier batches. I find it all a bit fascinating.

It's not vanlife, but I've been following Christoph Rehage recently (http://thelongestway.com/)

He's been walking from China to Europe on and off for a few years now. He's currently walking through Iran.

He has some amazing interactions on the road, it's incredible how many people stop to talk to him, or give him food (or in one case, try and rob him at gunpoint for his watch).

One thing I like about his blog and journey is that he doesn't seem to be documenting a lifestyle, or push a philosophy on anyone. He just enjoys walking.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#223

Post by Mediterraneo10 »

United857 wrote: post #67

Every reputable travel publication/blog I know of have strict editorial policies against accepting freebies/discounts/gifts in exchange for reviews/coverage. Those so-called "influencers" aren't really about serving their audience -- they strike me as just a scammy way to travel "for free".

> Every reputable travel publication/blog I know of have strict editorial policies against accepting freebies/discounts/gifts in exchange for reviews/coverage.

We must move in separate travel worlds. Within bicycle touring, travelers with established blogs very often accept free stuff, because this hobby requires a great deal of gear (and gear replacement) that isn't cheap. But this usually doesn't affect their reputability in the eyes of the community, especially when they review some of this gear negatively and note how it broke on the road.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#224

Post by toomanybeersies »

futurix wrote: post #17

I just want to know who the heck takes recommendations of 'influencers' seriously? Gullible teens with no money?

Most people I know who follow "influencers" are blokes who just want to see hot chicks on their Insta feed, or girls with insecurity issues who want to live vicariously through Instagram.

Influencers do work for that certain demographic though, to an extent. Contiki, who offer group travel packages for the 20-something year old market who just want to go on a bar crawl through Europe or Asia, use influencers a lot to sell their product. They're just in the right price bracket where they can say "look, for only $4000, you too can live this kind of lifestyle".

It's the budget-luxury brands that get the best value for money out of influencers. When people splash out a bit of money, they'll look at the successful influencers and say "I want to be like them", and buy the stuff that they're shilling, trying to buy the lifestyle.

Personally, I wouldn't go on a Contiki tour if you paid me, but there are people who enjoy that kind of travel. There are even travel companies that sell packages specifically designed so you can get as much Instagram material as possible, in an attempt to become an influencer yourself. It's a vicious, self feeding cycle.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#225

Post by toomanybeersies »

ryandrake wrote: post #134
cityhomesteader wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I just want to know who the heck takes recommendations of 'influencers' seriously? Their fans? > Gullible teens with no money? Probably. But gullible teens with no money have parents who have money and gullible teens with no money grow up to become adults with money. Hence why advertisers want to get to them when they are young. It's well known that earlier you can influence people, the more influence you can have.…

The difference, of course, is that lebron James and Tom Hanks have some other talent that can explain their fame, and The Atlantic journalists also are influential because of some other thing they do (besides influencing). These Instagram people are influencers because... why? What underlying talent or past event launched them into their positions?

George Clooney has no qualifications as a barista or in coffee at all, yet Nescafe still use him to shill off their terrible, polluting coffee machines.

Why should I trust him on coffee machines any more than some hot girl in a bikini on Instagram?

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#226

Post by gaius »

notimetorelax wrote: post #75
xapata wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently the advertisers buying space in FT's "How to spend it" issues think at least someone cares.

I think of this publication as a guide to expensive presents for your wife or a girlfriend.

... by way of apology for working all the time and neglecting her... It’s a big circle.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#227

Post by netsharc »

tlrobinson wrote: post #205
21 wrote: post #34

I've seen something which I think is even more interesting. Second tier influencers (100k followers) paying expensive hotels and private plane trips of first tier influences (1 mil followers), so that they can appear on their feeds, and gain new followers.

Anna Delvrey tops them all, at least in ambition: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/04/my-misadventure-with... TL;DR socialite of unknown authenticity (but definitely real confidence woman) scams a bank, luxury hotels and restaurants, private air charter company, and the author of that article out of several hundred thousand dollars. Did not get the $20M she was hoping for, though.

The article that broke the Anna Delvey story was more thrilling: https://www.thecut.com/2018/05/how-anna-delvey-tricked-new-y... . She managed to exploit people's need for vanity...

There's talk of a movie deal, so, her brazenness might be rewarded after all.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#228

Post by oliwarner »

overcast wrote: post #7
CamTin wrote: post #5

I wonder why the strategy of these "brand personalities" has to be limited to "luxury" type branding. For example, could you build a following traveling the country by interstate in a Fiesta, staying at Motel 6 and eating at Waffle House? It wouldn't cost Motel 6 and Waffle House almost anything to comp a few waffles and otherwise-unoccupied rooms as an experiment, if they aren't doing similar things already.

People want escapism. Something out of their ordinary lives. Like movies. As someone who is heavily involved in Instagram marketing, I don't see the value for anyone other than dreamers. Which is why my focus is niche, local, and accessible to everyone. In return I send a TON of real customers to places that I choose to promote.

> People want escapism

Do they really though? People are told and trained all their lives to want escapism. That their lives could be better if they drank X, drove Y and wore Z. It's a natural side effect of branding and advertising. It's not enough to sell to the people who actually need your product, you have to convince others that they want it too.

Consumerism is not a natural human mechanism. It's a hack of commerce and something we've only really been exposed to —in any scale— for the last couple of hundred years.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#229

Post by zaarn »

charlesdm wrote: post #119
Rjevski wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My thoughts exactly. It seems to me that the target market of these “influencers” is teens with little to no money that spend hours looking at these “influencers” exactly because these pictures are as close as they’re gonna get to that luxury lifestyle. People who can actually afford this will just go on holidays by themselves with no thoughts about the “influencers” whatsoever, also because by the time you can affor…

> People who can actually afford this will just go on holidays by themselves with no thoughts about the “influencers” whatsoever, also because by the time you can afford such lifestyles you widen up to the obvious commercial intents of these influencer “recommendations”, making their “review” purpose moot. Isn't the idea to follow people who, for example, travel to cool places that you might not have considered? Perh…

To my knowledge influencers rarely travel to "cool" places. They travel to family friendly, safe places. And safe in multiple meanings in both "people are safe here" and "this place is safe for me as influencer since noone will be offended".

My family used to travel a lot and we went to a lot of family-unsafe places at times (like in-the-wilderniss campsites in southern africa where you can't leave the RV because there is snakes and wild animals outside or climbing up several vulcanoes in iceland and I mean 'climb' not 'walk up a slope')

Those are actually cool places.

Re: Luxury hotels are being inundated with requests from self-described influencers

#230

Post by minhaz23 »

netsharc wrote: post #227
tlrobinson wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anna Delvrey tops them all, at least in ambition: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/04/my-misadventure-with... TL;DR socialite of unknown authenticity (but definitely real confidence woman) scams a bank, luxury hotels and restaurants, private air charter company, and the author of that article out of several hundred thousand dollars. Did not get the $20M she was hoping for, though.

The article that broke the Anna Delvey story was more thrilling: https://www.thecut.com/2018/05/how-anna-delvey-tricked-new-y... . She managed to exploit people's need for vanity... There's talk of a movie deal, so, her brazenness might be rewarded after all.

Vanity fair initially broke the store, the author was scammed by Anna Delvey.
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