Travel influencers are big business. But do they really drive bookings?

Choose Chicago is this year focusing on “mommy influencers” and budget travel content creators in cities such as Detroit and Kansas City, which are less than a day’s drive from Chicago.

The move comes as international tensions such as the war in Iran weigh on consumer confidence and international traveller numbers. “We have to be creative on the types of travellers that we connect with,” says chief marketing officer Lisa Nucci.

But while a viral social media post can quickly boost a business or a region, it can also strain resources. Residents of smaller Greek islands dread them being hyped as the new Santorini, while in north-eastern Italy locals have protested against a surge of tourists rushing to take photographs at viewpoints that have been popularised online.

Authorities in the municipality of Funes told CNN they would install barriers to restrict vehicle access to the popular Santa Maddalena church over the peak summer season.

“The problem with Instagram is that it ends up concentrating the interests in a few places,” says Glenn Fogel, chief executive of Booking Holdings, which owns travel agencies including Booking.com, Agoda and Priceline. “People start putting these pictures of themselves in these places and it looks so pretty,” he says. “Then everyone wants to go there, you end up with over-saturation, and then the place isn’t so pretty.” 

The impact is not just economic, but could also taint the basic appeal of travelling the world and seeking new experiences, not to mention conditions for local residents.

In June, Antoine Armand, mayor of the French Alpine city of Annecy, encouraged local influencers to promote alternative local destinations rather than Lake Annecy, which had become packed with tourists thanks in part to Instagram. He told Le Monde that the city needed to “act now” to avert “the risk of overcrowding”.

But others argue that social media can help disperse travellers and counter overtourism. On sites like Instagram, travellers are “discovering what were secondary and third-tier cities and making them very popular”, says Dimitris Manikis, president of Europe, Middle East and Africa for Wyndham Hotels & Resorts.