No, Your Instagram ‘Influence’ Is Not as Good as Cash, Club Owner Says | Hacker News Reader

No, Your Instagram ‘Influence’ Is Not as Good as Cash, Club Owner Says

nytimes.com

76 pointschewz69 comments

I 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.

> 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.

> 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.

Any situation like that is one where the influencer will not be trying to get free stuff, but will be selling his/her audience. (At least, given an understanding of the situation.) I.e. they are offering their services as an ad-hoc ad agency.

That's a far cry from folks asking for freebies for instagram photos. Those are hoping to be mistaken for the first category.

> the influencer will not be trying to get free stuff, but will be selling his/her audience

Yes selling their audience... for free hotel rooms and stays in resorts. It's not cash but they're still selling it.

It's also inherently problematic. Getting "sponsors" to pay you to talk about their product is in direct conflict with becoming/remaining an influencer.

Your audience needs to trust you. If your audience knows you are shilling for someone, they fundamentally can't trust you.

They can no longer trust that you are saying "This is an awesome product!" because you genuinely believe that. Maybe you actually think it's shite, but, hey, you needed to make rent this month. So, whatevs.

I've even seen people on the internet say "I used to read such and such ...until they began getting free samples and the like to support the blog. Then it went to shit and I quit reading."

It's a problem space I've thought about a lot because I blog. I am trying to get my writing supported primarily via tips and Patreon.

If my audience wants quality content it can trust, my audience needs to pay me. If they aren't paying me, "they are the product, not the customer" to borrow a popular phrase.

But selling out my audience so I can eat is not a thing I am interested in doing. It's flies in the face of the very reasons I blog.

Over the years, a lot of quality free content has either gone to shit or gone away. The expectation that good content should exist, but be free, is simply unsustainable.

Quality content takes time, effort and expertise to produce. It needs to pay, or most of the people who are any good will eventually go do something that does pay.

That's just reality.

And then we are left bitching about how there's nothing any good on the internet anymore and where is all the good stuff I remember from the good old days? (A fairly common refrain currently, actually.)

Yep, that's why I like how Consumer Reports has a firm policy of only judging products that were purchased on the same terms as ordinary people.

(No, they didn't pay me to say that...)

> Your audience needs to trust you. If your audience knows you are shilling for someone, they fundamentally can't trust you.

Some audiences just don't care or even think about that. And that audience are the main targets of those companies.

Do really think, that the sneaker community really cares about trusting a reviewer, if all the company needs to say to raise the prices, is that they produce that colour in a limited run?

You can get sponsors and remain trustworthy, you just need to disclose sponsorships, and curate the people who you actually take money from. This can be a problem because genuinely good product sponsorships are probably not the first ones you get offered as a content creator, but I've seen plenty of examples of this working and it pays more than ad revenue for most people.

I heard once of a small business that was in a remote and scenic location. It added a live webcam to their website. It showed the weather for their scenic locale. It eventually ended up with a crazy high amount of regular traffic.

They eventually sold ads for big money to a couple of big name companies. IIRC, Disney was one of them.

People were visiting the site for the live view from the webcam. The value they found in checking the live view from the webcam was not inherently harmed by having Disney ads on the site. (Those ads probably paid the business owners more than they made all year at their mom-and-pop shop in the middle of nowhere.)

There's also Everyday Carry. They interview people and do photos of the things they carry every day, then have links to where you can buy whatever these people carry -- their brand of cell phone or pen or whatever. I think it's brilliant.

I also know of content producers who make t-shirts and mugs and the like with their content on it. The ones that are successful tend to be entertainers doing something humorous. Effin' Birds and Questionable Content both do some of this.

Some problem spaces are easier to monetize than others. The above examples of success in no way changes anything I said in my previous comment.

Maybe I shall someday figure out how to be funny and make a mint selling t-shirts with my witticisms on them. But, so far, that doesn't seem to be my schtick.

> 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.

"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.

I wish we'd call them what they actually are: "freelance marketers".

Reminds 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.

There's plenty of douchebags that think 'because it's the internet' that gives free range to be a shitty person.

Some 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.

Yeah 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".

That 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.

I would make auto reply with link to Dunning-Kruger effect on Wikipedia.

I'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?

My 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 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-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.

You're missing the point entirely. The money is in affiliate marketing. Show off in bikinis/makeup and link to buy them. Every time someone buys you're earning a small percentage of the sale. It adds up very quickly.

General rule is at least 1/1000th of viewers are buyers. A youtube videos with hundreds of thousands of views have sold hundreds bikinis.

Companies may give you a product to show off for free or even pay you, but that doesn't make money like selling it.

General rule is at least 1/1000th of viewers are buyers. A youtube videos with hundreds of thousands of views have sold hundreds bikinis.

And as a general rule, each bikini sold nets the affiliate about 10¢. So with 100,000 views, that's ten bucks.

After deducting standard business expenses, travel, food, etc... (since "influencers" almost always have to pay their own way), you make about -$4,000 per trip.

I think this explains why so many "influencers" are riding on their parents' money.

You're severely underestimating the price of underwear. Don't forget to double because top and bottom are sold separately.

Somewhere between 10 and 100 dollars is not bad for a video that took a day to make in one's bedroom.

Don't know why you're talking about trips. It's never been about traveling. Traveling costs money, it doesn't pay. There are very profitable affiliate schemes for hotels but I doubt they are accessible to a solo teenager and it's nothing like selling a cheap item.

Yeah "ad revenue" - in my mind a link to Amazon is just another ad. But, I could have been more clear. And in Jimenez' case, is he really making his money from affiliate links? The article makes it sound like that's not it? I don't follow him, so no idea.

The person who runs Candy Japan posts the results of their Youtube unboxing videos and Youtube ads, and their conversion seems much lower than 1/1000.

Because candy doesn't solve problems like makeup, garcinia combogia or other weightless gadgets do.

And where are you getting those number from?

A lot of resorts will let instafluencers stay for free during the off-season to drum up additional publicity. From a business perspective, if the room isn't otherwise booked to a paying guest, the marginal cost of letting an instafluencer stay there gratis is almost nil. (They usually require the instafluencer to pay their own way to/from.)

12,000 is not a lot. My Instagram account for my dogs have 1,000 and I only post occasionally. That said, it didn't take much before some small vendors reached out to me about doing some small promotion like "here's a free leash, take a picture of your dogs with the leash". I don't know what level it takes for hotel stays but 12,000 is really low compared to even moderately popular Instagram accounts.

Some influencers are now faking the sponsored posts. They've paid for the product, but they're claiming it's a sponsored post because fake it til you make it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18747434

She's the only person who knows for sure if she is really getting compensated in some way or not.

Asking her directly may not get you a real answer.

The inside view and the appearance to outsiders always differs some, no matter the topic.

Very good point — apparently some people include #ad to make it seem like they do sponsored posts, even when they're not being paid. But to a potential advertiser, it seems like they have a track record as a paid influencer.

This could be a case of "fake it til you make it," which would be a good reason for potential sponsors to not be happy about this trend. A lot of so-called influencers won't actually make it. Giving them free stuff may have little to no hope of actually paying off.

Reminds me of something that happened recently.

A co-worker brought her kid to work. Another co-worker asked the child what he wanted to be when he grows up. The child responded instantly, "I want to be a YouTube star!"

10 years ago, that kid would have probably replied "Movie Star" instead of YouTube, not sure that a kid wanting to be a celebrity is bad.

That's more a sign of current distribution models than anything else. 20 years ago it would have been "I want to be a movie star!"

Sounds about right. It is really pathetic, instead of learning and becoming a marketer and mastering a skill, you can just post half baked pictures of yourself at various resorts and hotels and call it work.

Quite ironically, that is how many people in America feel about Silicon Valley, especially when they hear about the offices filled with arcade games and pinball machines and meditation rooms and on-site concierge chefs...

Marketing is a skill. Just because it doesn't appear valuable to you doesn't mean it's not valuable to someone. For examples on the importance of marketing, see the histories of Tesla, Tinder, most big-budget movies, nearly all triple-A games, Wool, Harry Potter, Twilight Saga, nearly all restaurants, most tangible goods purchased in a store, cars and trucks, airlines... The point is that just making a good product isn't enough anymore; there are plenty of good products. Marketing is what makes people aware that your product exists and/or makes it the preferred option the next time they are in need of that type of product.

I don't think any half decent establishment would fall for the Instagram "influencer" nonsense.

There was an article a few months back that described hotels and resorts getting inundated by "influencers" requesting free stays.

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/06/insta...

HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17330732

> “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!

As 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.

I don’t see the harm in the “influencers” asking. For some places it’s probably worth it to get the cheap promotion.

It certainly makes sense to try from the "influencer" side. The issue seems to be around the volume of requests and the extremely low bar to claim that you're an "influencer".

From the article: "The Jashita Hotel in Tulum has faced such an overwhelming number of inquiries from “influencers” over the past six months that the hotel has stopped working with them, said Abigail Villamonte, the front desk manager."

It's like giving your product away for free to a celebrity as a way of getting it seen in photos and such (can be a reasonable marketing effort for certain types of businesses), and then having a stream of random people asking for it for free too because people see them when they ride the subway or whatever.

I used to work at American Apparel, and people would try to get an "influencer discount" a few times per week.

I don't blame them for trying. Many of the "influencers" were women in college or their early 20s that just wanted to buy cute AA clothes, but could't really afford to pay 2-3x what stuff costs at H&M or Forever21, so they were hoping selfies could be used as a coupon to save money. I would totally do the same; worst that could happen is someone says "No" and my pride is a little hurt for a moment, but then everyone moves on.

The only really annoying influencers were the entitled ones who acted like they're Kylie Jenner because they have 1k followers (which are easy to fake in the beginning with free trial bots or follow4follow apps to cross the "1k" threshold quicker). Some of them would be straight up mean. Plus the regional manager would get mad after seeing too many discounts being applied in the daily closing report for items not on sale or promo. I think if someone brings up getting a discount for being an influencer and they get rejected, then they should just accept it and move on. The "Do you know who I am!", "Look at how many clothes I sell on Depop!", "You're gonna be sorry for not giving me what I want" customer is never a fun one to deal with. Then a few just flat out stole clothes in the dressing room then would leave the store. Working in retail was definitely not the best job, but it created a desensitization to dealing with shitty people.

I 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.

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.

Indeed -- 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.

I wonder how many of these "influencers" have as much to offer as Nikola Tesla. I imagine not... any.

Comparing wannabe instagram grifters, vagrants, freeloaders, and fraudsters to Tesla is disingenuous. Tesla gave more to the world than all these losers put together ever have.

The 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.

It 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!"

Are there companies that will ‘aggregate’ microinfluencers for advertisers?

Something like Socialbakers?

https://www.socialbakers.com/feature/influencer-marketing

That sounds like cohort targeting, like Stripe going after developers.

These influencers should try the club promoters, not the club owners. They will find more success.

Yep. 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.

The club promoters are real influencers.

This 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?

Why 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.)

I 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?

They do, and it’s possible. There are a bunch of tools to detect fake followers like on Twitter.

Bypass paywall: https://lm.facebook.com/l.php?u=https://www.nytimes.com/2019...

It works if you press continue Reading

(I want 501 karma to unlock down vote I am karmawhore sorry)

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