Sprinkling influencers here and there wasn’t working. Was there really an advantage to using an influencer over paid media? VisitLEX needed to determine the size of influencer to use, when to use them, and how to measure the impact.

30% incremental lift in travelers from their target demographic, metrics that surpassed their paid media, and unbeatable content.

Leslie Miller, VP of Marketing at VisitLEX, couldn’t quite crack influencer marketing. Like most destinations they often had local influencers and influencers traveling to Lexington pitch them. But it was hard to look at influencer media sheets and determine what the impact would be and why she wouldn’t just use paid ads. She asked her agency to help her run a test to see if a different approach would provide the results she was looking for.

Miller, and her agency, Cornett, sat down and strategized where and when they would use influencers in their marketing strategy.

“What we landed on was to use influencers when we wanted to speak to a really specific audience, in a really authentic way, to communicate something really specific.”

While that sounds like a micro influencer, Leslie is clear that it’s not, “If I personally connect with an influencer, it’s usually over something niche but they have massive followings.”

Cornett came back to Leslie with a short list of agencies – “We were really impressed with the way Steller presented themselves. Steller only handles travel and they just got us, they knew what we were trying to do from the beginning.”

From the beginning, there was a clear difference between Steller and other influencer agencies we’ve worked with in the past.

“Steller presented us with 5 influencers who were all very aligned with what we had asked for, in the past when we worked with other influencer agencies, I was given a huge spreadsheet of influencers to sift through.”

VisitLEX and Steller partnered with Tailor Payton, @HungryHomegirl, to visit Lexington and showcase their Juneteenth and SoulFeast celebrations. As with every campaign Steller handled the vetting process, contract negotiation, travel, itinerary, deliverables, and reporting.

“I have nothing but really great things to say about working with you guys. I feel like you’re a piece of our media mix and portfolio and will continue to be.”

Over the course of the campaign, Tailor posted about Lexington 23 times across her Instagram and TikTok accounts. Steller also posted 8 of her videos to their travel social media accounts. The content highlighted the heart of Lexington, the Juneteenth and SoulFeast celebrations, foodie hotspots, a small batch bourbon whiskey distillery, places to stay, and other things to do while in town. The content was so well received by her audience that the engagement was 67% higher than her average.

Tailor’s content continues to be viewed on Steller’s Lexington destination page and on BingTravel’s Lexington page.

“Often when I want to bring an influencer to town it’s at a time when there are events and I have travel writers and other people coming in. Our small team doesn’t have the time to manage influencers on the ground. Steller handles everything, what you offer really is turn key.”

Cornett, Lexington’s agency, is performance driven and they crunched the numbers at the end of the campaign. The campaign delivered 5M impressions and a reach of 698K with an earned media value of $72.9K. When calculated, the CPM (cost per thousand) was $6.30.

“I would have been happy if it had cost a little bit more than a paid ad, but we were really pleased with the metrics. But it’s the content too! It’s so much better. It tells a story to a really specific audience.”

When looking at campaign impact, the VisitLEX team marries together occupancy rate, average daily rates, and revenue per room with media metrics. They also work with a geolocation data partner and analyze that data as well.

The results were so good, Cornett encouraged VisitLEX to run another influencer campaign after looking at the results. Steller is currently running a 2nd campaign for VisitLEX.