STR Marketing Series: Driving Direct Bookings With Influencers

**Kaye Putnam:**Welcome back to Get Paid For Your Pad. I’m Kaye Putnam, Head of Marketing for Freewyld. Today, we’re talking about one of the most effective strategies we’ve used to grow direct bookings: influencer marketing. I’m here with Jasper Ribbers, co-founder of Freewyld.

**Jasper Ribbers:**Thanks, Kaye. It’s been amazing to see how this strategy has helped us increase awareness and fill our cabins, and you’ve been leading the charge. I know we’ve learned a lot from trial and error.

**Kaye:**We definitely have. When we started, we made a few mistakes, like selecting influencers just based on follower count. But we learned quickly what really drives results. One of our influencer reels reached over 350,000 people and brought in more than 5,000 new Instagram followers. Our direct bookings increased from 20% to 35% and are still growing.

**Jasper:**It’s been incredible. People even stop me on the street in San Diego saying they’ve seen us online. That awareness didn’t exist a year ago.

**Kaye:**Right, but influencer marketing isn’t about free stays in exchange for exposure. You need to think about ROI, engagement rate, and audience alignment. We’ll break down everything today: how we find influencers, how we vet them, what kind of content we ask for, and how we track results.

**Jasper:**And we’ll be sharing a free toolkit at the end: a custom influencer calculator, our creator content brief, and a downloadable version of Kaye’s presentation.

**Kaye:**Exactly. Let's dive in. First, you need to define your goal. Are you looking for reach or for content? Some influencers will give you both, but usually it leans one way or the other. For example, our collaboration with SoCal Nation reached 350,000 people because of a viral giveaway reel. But the value wasn’t just the reach, we earned over 5,000 new followers and a ton of website clicks.

**Jasper:**And that was just from one post.

**Kaye:**Yep. The secret? The giveaway format. People tag friends to enter, creating natural virality. But not every influencer wants to do that, you need to find creators who are open to giveaways and aligned with your brand. Also, make sure to get added as a "collaborator" on the reel so you can access analytics and increase visibility.

**Jasper:**Let’s talk about evaluating influencers. Follower count doesn’t tell the whole story.

**Kaye:**Nope. Engagement rate is a better indicator. We aim for creators with at least a 1% engagement rate. We use Chrome extensions and tools like influencersearcher.com to screen them. Also, make sure their audience is actually your guest demographic. Our early partnerships were with influencers who had big followings, but their audience wasn’t aligned, they were mostly men who weren’t likely to book a cabin getaway.

**Jasper:**So even if the content was good, it didn’t translate to bookings.

**Kaye:**Right. But we still got great content we could reuse. That’s the second big question: do you want audience exposure, or are you looking for beautiful, reusable content? If it’s the latter, you want someone who produces high-quality visuals. We worked with Journey More, paid $2,500 for two stays and got both good reach and incredible content.

**Jasper:**I remember we gave out discount codes, but people didn’t use them much.

**Kaye:**Exactly. Direct attribution is tough in travel. People rarely book immediately. But we can track growth through trends: more website clicks, more Instagram traffic, and most importantly, more direct bookings. We ask guests where they heard about us, and more than half say Instagram.

**Jasper:**Let’s get tactical. How do we find influencers?

**Kaye:**We look locally, people who post about Southern California, cabins, or travel. I also reach out directly via DM. For example, I contacted Nikki and Hayden from Journey More with a simple message: "Hey, love your work. We’re looking for creators to collaborate with at our cabins. Do you travel to SoCal?" That kicked off a great partnership.

**Jasper:**And they weren’t even local. But the quality of their content made it worthwhile.

**Kaye:**Exactly. But going forward, we’re focusing more on LA and San Diego creators. It just makes sense.

**Jasper:**How do we ensure influencers stay on-brand?

**Kaye:**We created a content guide. Ours explains our Wyld Mode philosophy: disconnect to reconnect with nature and your people. We want creators to show stargazing, hiking, journaling, not just bubble baths and movie nights. We also include a contract that outlines deliverables, dates, and gives us usage rights for the content.

**Jasper:**And how do we measure ROI?

**Kaye:**We track impressions, engagement, new followers, profile link clicks, and site traffic. We also created a custom influencer calculator to help STR hosts evaluate if a collaboration is worth it. You input follower count, engagement rate, niche alignment, content quality, and partnership cost, it outputs a score from 0 to 100.

**Jasper:**That tool is a game-changer.

**Kaye:**Yes! You can grab it at FreewyldFoundry.com/influencer. Along with our influencer guide and presentation deck. All free.

**Jasper:**Awesome. And if you take action and land a great influencer, message us! We want to hear about your results.

**Kaye:**Totally. And we’ll be back soon with more marketing episodes: email, SEO, and more.

**Jasper:**Can’t wait. Thanks, Kaye.

**Kaye:**Thank you!