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This chapter assesses how luxury travel imaginaries were modified in the aftermath of the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic. Drawing on long-term fieldwork among travel influencers, the chapter presents their response strategies to the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on an analysis of evidence from participant observation in tourist sites, network visualisations, in-depth interviews and platform profiles, I trace the transformations luxury travel imaginaries have undergone since the beginning of 2020. Before this global crisis, travel influencers became new puissant players in the highly globalised tourism industry as they regularly received assignments from tourism boards and hotels. Although brand sponsorship was considered a substantial source of revenue for travel influencers, their collaborations in travel destinations and the monetisation of travel content on YouTube were further assets to secure a livelihood. The coronavirus outbreak, however, turned their life-worlds upside down. This ethnographic investigation identified three main responses of travel influencers to the current long-term crisis of tourism: (1) diversification of content creation and orientation towards other influencer genres, (2) support for local tourism organisations and online promotion of staycations and (3), finally, travel to tourist sites for circulating online content on safe travel standards. Digital platforms became a major arena where the future of tourism has been re-negotiated in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak. The in-depth investigation suggests that travel influencers were in a position to create new powerful representations of luxury as safe travel since they acquired the skills to establish stable storyworlds for their travel experiences, which attracted the attention of large platform audiences.

Social media influencers increasingly determine what is fashionable. By creating and sharing visual contents, predominantly on Instagram, they shape what social media users see and aspire to. Their contents reflect Instagram esthetics and their own personal brands. This chapter argues that their visuals also represent emerging visual practices and styles that are typical of influencers and transcend fashion and tourism contexts. Using a netnographic approach, this chapter examines Instagram posts of 20 tourism and fashion mega-influencers. It finds common practices but also identifies differential ways in which fashion and tourism visuals are constructed. This chapter highlights how the subjects have intertwined, especially when it comes to influencers.

Digital influencers, besides being a personal branding phenomenon, constitute, nowadays, important partners for brands in the digital environment. Despite the benefits for both parties, the brand and the endorser, there is a risk when the individuals or the brand take part in some scandal or questionable activity, which causes a loss of credibility and reputation. The contagious effect of personal or corporate brand crisis with the partners is well reported in the literature. However, there are no studies about such occurrence in the digital environment, considering that the phenomenon of digital influence has some particularities differing from traditional celebrity endorsement. This chapter focuses on the research of the consequences of a change in the credibility of influencers or brands, after the occurrence of a negative situation, and the way in which this change affects the two parties involved, the brand and the influencer. We conducted a netnographic study of the social media pages of three digital influencers and the social media pages of a recognized fast fashion brand recognized in the digital world. We analyzed 1500 social media comments from their audiences and found that influencers suffer from a loss in sympathy and credibility by scandals while crisis communication strategies in corporate brands can prevent such damages. Strategic implications for brand managers and digital influencers managing their endorsements are addressed in the discussion.

The author addresses the world of Instagram influencers but offers a very different perspective by focusing on the gendering of claims to authenticity on social media. The author observes how high-profile male and female Czech influencers are required to navigate an authenticity bind (Duffy & Hund, 2019) through two key strategies: the opinion-leader strategy and the community-building strategy. Men rely predominantly on the opinion-leader strategy while women position themselves as community builders. By focusing on the communicative strategies of the influencers, the author offers an analysis of authenticity as performative process, rather than a static concept, that gets negotiated in everyday interactions between influencers and their followers.