Influencers and Gurus in Hotel Social Media Marketing

An excellent article by Open Press Wire should make us reflect on several things that, curiously, in Spain are occurring only in the Tourism Sector, especially in the hotel landscape. The scarcity of Social Media Marketing success stories in Spain makes it easy for anyone in our country to position themselves as a great theorist and expert on the field. In fact, anyone can be an influencer—myself included, for example—by producing four rehashed articles, picking bits from here and there, publishing them and appearing to be an expert or a guru. It is true—let us not kid ourselves—we have been saying that knowledge about Social Media can be found within social media itself, and this has led many bloggers, myself included, with a clear self-taught vocation, to decide to launch our own blogs. I disagree with the article on just one point: paraphrasing the great Borges, “What matters is not what one writes, but what one reads.” Therefore, I believe that a true expert is not the person who produces better or worse content online, but the one who, through their learning and experience, has been able to successfully implement the actions they have learned about online. Although it may seem like I am shooting myself in the foot, I believe it is advisable:

• Do not trust influencers or their content, not even those who are relevant or claim to be, not even my own. This may simply be driven by personal or corporate positioning strategies.
• Do not believe everything you read online. Having a great deal of content and a large audience does not make anyone right, and it can lead to misconceptions that later result in failure.
• Judge Experts not by their content or their audiences, but by such simple questions as “where did this person come from?” and “why do they do what they do?”.  None of us is good enough to do it from a purely altruistic perspective; we are all motivated by self-interest.
• Above all, assess your own needs. Let us not assume that everything we read online and that is presented to us as necessary and essential is truly essential for our hotel.
• Be critical—very critical—of everything that is put forward; do not believe everything at first glance, verify everything and assess the feasibility, usefulness and return of each and every action we propose from our blogs.

The fact is that we are not such good people, let us admit it. We are here driven by something: whether it is learning, teaching, showing off, promoting our own business or promoting someone else’s business, whatever it may be, none of this makes any of us right or turns us into experts in anything, no matter how much exposure or how many subscribers we have. Someday, those who have done the things I recommend will come along and will have delivered success stories from which we will all learn; we will call them Experts, and we will write about it too. That is why I criticise influencers: not because I, a mere learner, believe I am one of them, but because no one has yet proven to be one in this field. Poor me, if all I know how to do is manage and market hotels, and that is how I make my living. Until then… we must put up with it, take a deep breath and bite our tongues.