The impact of influencer marketing practices in accommodation businesses

Today, influencers, which have an important place in digital marketing strategies, play a critical role in the processes of increasing brand awareness, attracting customers and increasing sales of accommodation businesses (AB). This study aims to investigate THE IMPACT OF INFLUENCER MARKETING PRACTICES IN ACCOMMODATION BUSINESSES. The role of social media platforms on the marketing activities of AB was evaluated. For this purpose, a questionare study was conducted in Turkiye. For the questionare, the "Random Sampling Technique", one of the "Probability Sampling" methods, was used and the study was completed with a total of 385 participants with a 5% deviation from the population average at 95% confidence interval using proportional random sampling method. According to the results obtained, it was found that instagram and youtube are the most used social media platforms, instagram is the most effective social media platform for accommodation businesses with 75% of the participants. The most time spent on social media is 2-3 and 3-4 hours, however, spending a long time on social media is not only related to social media influencers on the topic of selection and marketing of accommodation businesses and is also used for other purposes. Young people and bachelor's degree graduates in terms of education are more likely to be interested in AB selection and marketing. As a result, it is possible to conclude that the relationship between social media influencers and social media is important in the selection and marketing of AB, and that many different factors (age, education, income level, content and structure of social media, time spent on social media, etc.) play an important role in this regard. Depending on the developing technology, it can be mentioned that further development of the use of influencers and social media for AB is necessary and important in terms of marketing.