Fyre Fest…um….didn’t go well. From the dueling documentaries released on Hulu and Netflix this week to the ongoing lawsuits, news, and jokes, we’re still fascinated with Fyre - like watching a burning car or disaster on TV. I watched the Netflix doc this weekend, which was very well done, and found myself not just fascinated by the story, but by the social media involved with the event as well.
Fyre Fest started with influencer marketing and ended with a viral tweet about a “sandwich” from one of the attendees. The entire reason attendees spent thousands of dollars on tickets, transportation, and extras was based on fabricated websites and one (1) photoshoot on a different island in the Bahamas. Likewise, the world found out about Fyre in real time because of online posts from those who showed up. While the event itself has cemented it’s place in infamy, there’s a ton to be learned from the social media around the event, and how it pertains to marketing other entities online.
Influencer Marketing
The buzz around Fyre Fest was created almost entirely by influencer marketing, specifically on Instagram - with the major marketing piece a photoshoot weekend. The promotional video is still live on Fyre’s Youtube channel:
Now, the Netflix doc spent a lot of time discussing how good this promotional video is and how it provided the content for Fyre up until the festival - and they are exactly right. This is a great piece of influencer marketing…or it would be if it was true.
LESSON: SEEING IS NOT BELIEVING ONLINE
The video is well produced. The shots are put together with solid cuts, and a great soundtrack is included. None of it happened for attendees of the event - in fact, the line about “an island formerly owned by Pablo Escobar” got them kicked OFF that island and relocated to a different part of the Bahamas, but that’s a different issue. The key element here is that the marketing video for an event - or short, produced clips from an event - should never be indicative of the event experience itself. Between amazing video producers, built in filters on phones and apps, and a claim of an experience without information to back it up, consumers need to be wary of what advertising they see online, and those who create the content need to make sure their marketing speaks to an event. While working in pro-hockey, we used to change our camera angle occasionally and sell tickets across from the camera first, as it made the arena feel more full - while certainly not fraud, we framed the game the way we wanted people to see it. Fyre Fest was no different, but when they set themselves very lofty goals by creating this video containing these influencers, and failed to even marginally approach these standards, they were dead in the water before the event even started. Expectations set on social media rarely meet reality, and both those selling and buying need to be aware of it.
LESSON: INFLUENCERS NEED TO BUY IN
Bella Hadid was one of the major influencers for Fyre Festival, helping launch the sales campaign by a) appearing in the video above and b) posting (along with approximately 400 other IG influencers) this on Instagram:
Now, in defense of Fyre’s social media team - this is a BRILLIANT way to launch an event. It creates buzz, builds your own social media pages, gives you a massive reach in your target demographics, and sells the product with minimal work. Obviously, the follow-through on the event failed, but this was a great launch event. However, there are risks when using influencers - especially when they aren’t partners - and Fyre ran into a bunch of them.
If your influencer has no skin in the game - no measure of success or reward for participating - then they have less reason to help you out. Social media can be, and usually is, a selfish business - influencers build their following with their skills to turn themselves into a business. Furthermore, your success is not tied to their success, and they have no obligation to you other than the contracted posts. This is incredibly dangerous for a company, as it opens them to various issues with the marketing. Vice-versa is also true for the influencer - without a stake in the event’s success, they are open to criticism if there are issues. Fyre tried to pay their influencers not just in cash, but with the experience of the festival, something that didn’t give the influencer much reason to support the event. In the case of Fyre, attorneys attempted to include some of their influencers in the subsequent class-action lawsuit, as they had not disclosed they were paid advertisers. Now, the lawsuit didn’t proceed, as the influencers were unaware of the castastrophe they had advertised until it happened, but it forced some of them, like Bella Hadid, to apologize for promoting an event they weren’t running:
LESSON: DISCLOSE PAID MARKETING POSTS
This was explicitly said by one of the attorneys in the documentary, so it’s pretty important - it creates legal separation from your company, event, etc and the influencer, in case either side does something problematic. CYA - cover your ass.
The User Experience is the Real Story
Fyre Fest was promoted across social media prior to the event with thousands of posts by influencers, bands, paid marketers, and attendees. The most memorable post was probably this:
LESSON: YOU CONTROL THE MESSAGE UNTIL YOU DON’T.
Two major lessons here, and both are pretty self explanatory. First, while you may have a massive content and marketing team, the fact of the matter is that brands only control part of the message - those participating tell more of it. When that sandwich went viral, not only was the Festival in the tank, but Twitter users started looking for more news of #FyreFail. The story was out of Fyre’s hands instantly, and there was no coming back from that gaff. The other lesson?
LESSON: USER GENERATED CONTENT IS TRUSTED MORE THAN BRAND CONTENT
It’s all fine and well to market your event or product online - in fact, it’s now almost an essential part of a business. But you better deliver what you promise, because those who attend or use a product have instant means of providing feedback - not to the company directly, but to the internet as a whole. While Fyre spent months pumping out content about their event - all from the same marketing shoot - the posts from those at the event went viral much faster, and reached many more people without any cost.
For those of you in social media, what other social media lessons can be learned from Fyre’s failure? Shoot me a tweet at @cknoblock17 and I’ll share them!