YouTuber asks for free hotel room -Gets refused!

Wow. Talk about escalation.
The Hotel guy wildly over-reacted to the request in my opinion, and then the vlogger gal wildly over-reacted to his over-reaction. I guess they both got what they wanted out of it in the end, which is plenty of media attention.
I thought vlogger gal was quite professional and respectful in her initial email, and as somebody else pointed out there is no harm in asking.
I wouldn't want to think that aspiring vloggers are discouraged from reaching out to sponsors as a result of this story, but they should take away from it the importance of doing research on your potential sponsor. If vlogger gal had researched the hotel even just a little she would have seen that they already have a significant social media presence and she could not really offer them much value in return for a weekend stay at prime time. Far better to target a hotel that is weak on social media, maybe one that is just starting out on a social media push.
 
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As a YouTuber and someone who works in hospitality, I've gotta say that I'm siding with the hotel on this. I don't care if she gets a million viewers a minute, trying to get a free room that might bring in a few more bookings on one of the business weekends a year when he can put GUARANTEED money in there is just ridiculous.

Second, some Youtubers - especially vloggers - need to get over this notion that their view count gives them megaceleb status. Here's the deal - the biggest names on Youtube (PewDiePie, Shane Dawson, PhillyD, etc) aren't on a list of people that can influence huge swathes of people to do anything. They might be YouTube Royalty, but they're a long way behind the Katy Perrys and TaylorSwifts of the world and need to remember that.

Also, her channel isn't even as big as she claims it to be. Just all round shot herself in the foot here.

As for the public humiliation, she got and then cried about? The video she made in response justified it. Whiny entitlement never convinced anyone that you deserved anything.
 
I love the response from the hotel, but I hate that he shamed her publicly. It kind of ruins how on point the e-mail was. If she had been more obnoxious in her request then I could understand, but she wasn't that bad.
 
I think he should of replied with no instead of humiliating her on his page, I can understand why he said no because he works hard running the hotel, but also so many YouTubers try collaborating with business so it’s no out of the ordinary for a YouTuber to ask to collaborate or to get sponsored, but at the same time a lot of people just want free stuff and don’t actually care about the business at all. I still don’t think he needed to go public about it unless she went public about it first
 
Chasing Lamely said:
As a YouTuber and someone who works in hospitality, I've gotta say that I'm siding with the hotel on this. I don't care if she gets a million viewers a minute, trying to get a free room that might bring in a few more bookings on one of the business weekends a year when he can put GUARANTEED money in there is just ridiculous.

Second, some Youtubers - especially vloggers - need to get over this notion that their view count gives them megaceleb status. Here's the deal - the biggest names on Youtube (PewDiePie, Shane Dawson, PhillyD, etc) aren't on a list of people that can influence huge swathes of people to do anything. They might be YouTube Royalty, but they're a long way behind the Katy Perrys and TaylorSwifts of the world and need to remember that.

Also, her channel isn't even as big as she claims it to be. Just all round shot herself in the foot here.

As for the public humiliation, she got and then cried about? The video she made in response justified it. Whiny entitlement never convinced anyone that you deserved anything.
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You underestimate the cult effect of an influencer. Have you seen the Logan Paul reactions? Many negative, sure, but LOTS of positive and defense for the guy.

As for being paid for the room, that's a fair stance. But if I accommodate a complimentary room for a YouTuber that gets a "million views per minute," and convert even 0.5% of that, that's 5,000 paid rooms for one accommodation. Better yet, that 1 million views per minute is a whole lot of brand recognition built.
 
PictureFIT said:
You underestimate the cult effect of an influencer. Have you seen the Logan Paul reactions? Many negative, sure, but LOTS of positive and defense for the guy.

As for being paid for the room, that's a fair stance. But if I accommodate a complimentary room for a YouTuber that gets a "million views per minute," and convert even 0.5% of that, that's 5,000 paid rooms for one accommodation. Better yet, that 1 million views per minute is a whole lot of brand recognition built.
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I tend to agree. How much can a room possibly cost in this hotel even over the Valentines Day weekend? €300? €400? Lets say that if at the most the hotel was losing €1000 in cash revenue, they should consider what they can get in digital marketing or other advertising for that price and weigh it in the balance. I don't think it is at all out of order for a YouTuber with a solid following to suggest a couple of free nights in exchange for exposure.

As I mentioned in a previous comment, she was barking up the wrong tree with this particular hotel since they already had a strong online presence, but in principle I think the proposal was a fair one.
 
Yachts For Sale said:
I tend to agree. How much can a room possibly cost in this hotel even over the Valentines Day weekend? €300? €400? Lets say that if at the most the hotel was losing €1000 in cash revenue, they should consider what they can get in digital marketing or other advertising for that price and weigh it in the balance. I don't think it is at all out of order for a YouTuber with a solid following to suggest a couple of free nights in exchange for exposure.

As I mentioned in a previous comment, she was barking up the wrong tree with this particular hotel since they already had a strong online presence, but in principle I think the proposal was a fair one.
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100% agree that she went up against the wrong business. They already had videos expressing hate for influencers. She should have done her research beforehand but still didn't deserve to be publicly ridiculed for her request. As someone that used to give free training services for sake of brand growth and referrals, I stand by the power of word-of-mouth. I simply remind myself that a positive ROI is anything greater than 1 free session.
 
PictureFIT said:
100% agree that she went up against the wrong business. They already had videos expressing hate for influencers. She should have done her research beforehand but still didn't deserve to be publicly ridiculed for her request. As someone that used to give free training services for sake of brand growth and referrals, I stand by the power of word-of-mouth. I simply remind myself that a positive ROI is anything greater than 1 free session.
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IMO she wasn't publicly announced until she told them in her video it was her. The owner kept her identify removed by via screenshot and post. She is the one who identified herself in this instance.
 
I'm actually starting to side with her just because the hotel guy got REALLY ugly about it and is taking it way out of hand if you look at their Facebook page. :(
 
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