Top Dubai Influencer Lady Fozaza Rips This New Hotel On The Palm To Pieces
Usually, when a new hotel opens in Dubai, all the ‘Influencers’ are invited to stay, and they then share very flattering images to generate buzz about the venue. So when Alanoud Badr, a top fashion influencer in Dubai, aka Fozaza shared her negative verdict of a brand new hotel, The Viceroy on The Palm Jumeirah, it came as a surprise. She posted the following message to her Instagram stories:
“You guys know I’d never talk bad about anything or anyone. But what a waste of time visiting that place was! The worst staff, worst service, worst experience”
Alanoud Badr aka Fozaza
This clearly wasn’t what the Viceroy expected
This is one person’s verdict, as we all know how hard the hospitality industry is. Many reviews and feedback about the new Viceroy are that it is a beautiful hotel with great restaurants and service. Just like its sister hotel in Abu Dhabi has been for years. The hotel opened it’s doors this month and it looks like a great addition to the stunning hotels already on the Palm.
Fozaza has over 500k followers on Instagram…
…and many brands work with her to produce digital marketing campaigns
Top influencers receive thousands of dollars for Instagram posts
‘Influencers’, in marketing speak, are an extension of what bloggers were, and the term refers to those who have a large following on social media. Brands pay large sums of money to have posts shared on their profiles. This is supposed to work as an endorsement of the brand (automotive company, fashion brand, hotel or other) and help their marketing efforts and sales.
There any many levels of influencers in Dubai, those who are invited by PR agencies to attend events or reviews in exchange for a few Instagram posts or Snapchat stories. Then there are those high-end influencers, who are represented by talent management companies like the Bukash Brothers or have their own agents. These influencers charge, depending on the size of their following, anywhere between $2,000 and $10,000 for an Instagram post, some will then remove it after seven days. Before you quit your job and become an influencer, the reason for what would seem an extortionate price are two things:
1) Reach and engagement – to reach half a million people and get say 10 thousand engagements would cost more than this on some media channels, there is also the argument that an endorsement from someone with a loyal following, that ‘word of mouth’ as it were’ is more effective for brands than a tradition ad
2) Content – content or ads also costs money to produce, ‘influencers’ are in effect creating the ad for you, some of them are excellent at creating videos, images, and copy, so the fee that a brand would usually pay their agency, is no longer required
Many people believe the industry is unregulated, lacking measurement metrics that regular digital advertising has. There are also issues surrounding fake followers and authenticity of the endorsement from the influencer.
