The reach of Instagram and other social media channel influencers has taken hold of the global travel business, with tourism operators and consumers seeking the best deals tailored to their budget and destination desires.
As marketing spending and management focus switches to social channels, Flinders University’s Dr Naser Pourazad and colleagues asked 530 Australian customers how much their travel plans could be swayed by such influencers.
The researchers sought to measure how travel social media influencers (TSMIs) could affect travel decisions in the pre-, post- and purchasing stages of the customer ‘journey’.
“It emerges that the informativeness and persuasiveness of TSMIs seems to significantly impact destination choice, while identification with the influencer plays a lesser role,” says Dr Pourazad, a senior lecturer in marketing at Flinders University’s College of Business, Government and Law.
“Lumped together, it appears that TSMIs can gather significant involvement and outreach by tapping into the attitudes and needs of target consumers, forming optimal engagement or partnerships by the right messaging – including post-visit experience sharing.”
With Instagram, Facebook and TikTok among the most influential platforms, Instagram has the ability to visually provide persuasive storytelling capable of shaping destination image and choice. Successful influencers on the platform have been seen to engage a large customer base, especially Millennials and Generation Z, by building trust and endorsing their travel destination choices.
“Our study delves deeper into understanding the customer’s processing of influencer information and the psychological persuasion it might exert, giving guidelines to improve the success of brands’ use of TSMIs and, ultimately, the tourist experience – including to new, less-explored places,” Dr Pourazad says.
The research from Flinders University and UniSA concludes that successful interactive TSMI content (such as campaigns, contests, shared tourist photos and personalised tips and ‘travel hacks’) will continue to build key connections in all stages of the customer journey.
They say pre-testing content can ensure that it will be seen as informative and persuasive enough to enhance the overall customer experience. As well, future research could explore the dynamics between TSMIs in other social media platforms such as TikTok and YouTube, and compared against other digital sources of information such as generative AI tools including ChatGPT, traditional media or peer recommendations.
The article, ‘Influencers and the choice of a travel destination: a customer journey and information processing perspective’ (2025) by Naser Pourazad, Lara Stocchi (UniSA) and Lucy Simmonds (Flinders University) has been published in Information Technology & Tourism (Springer Nature Link) – DOI: 10.1007/s40558-025-00330-6