RebeloVieira Jessica 2020 TBSansAnnexe

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Abstract
Social media is an essential marketing tool; platforms such as Instagram are important
for companies as it gives a visual aspect for followers to identify themselves with. Through
diverse researches, success factors have been identified and compared with results obtained
by analyzing Six Senses Douro Valley’s strategy used on the platform. The aim is to determine
the impact of Instagram Campaigns led by the hotel.
To reach the objectives set, a detailed analysis of 414 Instagram posts, from the 1st of
January 2019 to the 31st of December 2019, was conducted. The key factors analyzed were
supported by three other opinions, and then, the results were interpreted with the help of a
descriptive analysis and cross tables executed on Excel to determine whether there was any
link between the different variables.
The results demonstrated some differences with the success factors that were
diagnosed in the researches. Simple guests with low followers appear to deliver the best and
most of Six Senses Douro Valley’s content, while Influencers which are considered to be one
of the best-promoting tools show low results. This is the most important information as it
shapes the entire strategy of the hotel.
This thesis shows that Six Senses Douro Valley has a successful marketing strategy and
can be held accountable for its success. Indeed, there are only few recommendations to be
given as their campaigns were proven to have a great impact on the interactions of their
audience with their Instagram account and with the hotel’s bookings.
Keywords: Instagram, Marketing Strategy, Six Senses Group, Influencers, User-Generated-Content
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Foreword and Acknowledgements
Nowadays, Influencer Marketing is very present; social media platforms are filled with
sponsored content featuring influencers. Not all of the content is necessarily sponsored; it can
simply be generated by an influencer and posted as a normal photo on their feed. This type of
user-generated-content tends to work better as it appears to be more honest. Many sources
in this thesis support the fact that user-generated-content is extremely important and
essential to create word-of-mouth and attract new customers.
The interest of the author in this topic is related to her role as a lifestyle micro-
influencer on Instagram. Indeed, she often works with fashion brands and promotes their
products with either normal or sponsored campaigns. Therefore, she understands this type of
marketing; however, it is very different when it comes to promoting a hotel. It is not essentially
the same methods that work best with, for example, followers preferring nice landscape
photos rather than photos with people on them. Also, how they would trust other guests
rather than influencers is very different and interesting to identify.
By specializing in E-tourism, the researcher already had knowledge on campaigns,

advertisements, or social media in general. Therefore, with this thesis, she wanted to truly
understand how to determine the impact of campaigns led by Six Senses Douro Valley by
applying her skills.
There were some difficulties encountered such as the analysis of variables and how to
understand the link between the different factors identified by the author. A deeper
comprehension of the term campaign was also needed as in this case, it is interpreted as a
regular post made with the intention of promoting a service and not a paid advertisement.
Despite that, the author finished her work thanks to the guidance of her thesis advisor,
Roland Schegg, who was of great help and advice during the writing of this thesis. She would
also like to thank the Six Senses Douro Valley team and more precisely, Isabel Cerqueira, for
all the information given about the hotel and its strategy. Without her, the research would
not be complete. Last but not least, her friends who supported and reassured her throughout
the process; Christian Dal Busco, Aurélie Stampfli, Inès Salih, and Alexis Auchlin.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF TABLES V
LIST OF FIGURES VI
LIST OF ABREVIATIONS VII
INTRODUCTION 1
CHAPTER 1. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 3
1.1 Digitalized Marketing and Why it Became so Important 3
1.2 Instagram’s Rise to Success 8
1.3 Six Senses Douro Valley’s Vision 13
CHAPTER 2. RESEARCH QUESTION 18
2.1 SSDV Analysis 18
2.2 Objectives of the Research 21
CHAPTER 3. METHODOLOGY 22
3.1 Different Steps 22
3.2 Preparation of the Grid 23
3.3 Data Analysis Process 29
3.4 Others Analysis 30
CHAPTER 4. PRESENTATION OF RESULTS 34
4.1 Content Producer Results 34
4.2 Followers Results 36
4.3 Month Results 37
4.4 Day Results 38
4.5 Topic Results 39
4.6 People Results 41
4.7 Description Results 42
III
4.8 Hashtags Results 43
4.9 Insights Results 44
CHAPTER 5. ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION 46
5.1 Best Content Producer Profile 46
5.2 Best Timing 47
5.3 Best Photo Type 48
5.4 Best Post Caption 49
5.5 Best Number of Hashtags 50
5.6 Insights Actions Taken 50
CHAPTER 6. RECOMMENDATIONS 52
6.1 Author’s Recommendations 52
6.2 Discussion with Marketing Expert 54
6.3 Limitations 56
CONCLUSION 58
REFERENCES 60
APPENDIX I: SCREENSHOT OF SSDV’S INSTAGRAM FOLLOWERS ON THE 8TH OF APRIL 2020 69
APPENDIX II: TOP 10 PHOTOS IN TERMS OF LIKES, POSTED ON SSDV ACCOUNT 70
APPENDIX III: FULL GRID OF ANALYSIS 75
APPENDIX IV: DESCRIPTIVE ANALYSIS AND CROSS TABLES 82
APPENDIX V: SCREENSHOT FROM THE INSIGHTS OF THE TOP 10 MOST LIKED PHOTOS ON
INSTAGRAM 88
APPENDIX VI: GRID CREATED FOR THE INSIGHTS 93
APPENDIX VII: INTERVIEW WITH ISABEL CERQUEIRA 94
AUTHOR’S DECLARATION 98
IV
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Grid created on Excel by the author 24
Table 2: Grid created on Excel by the author, Top 10 Likes 29
Table 3: Grid created on Excel by the author for others analysis 31
Table 4: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Christian Dal Busco 31
Table 5: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Alexis Auchlin 32
Table 6: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Aurélie Stampfli 33
Table 7: Histogram created on Excel by the author 35
V
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Different levels of Influencers by Later (2019) 10
Figure 2: Screenshot from the official SSDV Instagram of February’s storytelling of Douro's tradition "Croça"
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Figure 3: Screenshot of American influencer, Ana Politan, telling the story about how the hotel adopts street
dogs in the region, on her Instagram 17
Figure 4: Screenshot from SSDV’ account of own content 18
Figure 5: Screenshot from SSDV account sharing a photo from a guest 19
Figure 6: Screenshot from SSDV asking for permission to post a photo with #YesSixSenses hashtag 20
Figure 7: Screenshot from SSDV’s photo of Aqua and its numerous comments 21
Figure 8: Screenshot from SSDV's post giving credit to a UGC 25
Figure 9: Image content Performance on Instagram by Later (2019) 27
Figure 10: How Instagram Hashtags Impact Engagement by Later (2019) 28
Figure 11: Screenshot from SSDV’s analytics, sorting the top liked photos 30
Figure 12: Insights from post 1 & 2 88
VI
LIST OF ABREVIATIONS
EWOM: e-Word-of-Mouth
UGC: User-Generated-Content
SM: Social Media
SSDV: Six Senses Douro Valley
VII
Introduction
The growth of the internet and social media is overwhelming; with so many new
platforms and innovative ways of communicating and promoting, companies need to keep up
and develop their strategy to reach their customers. Unlike traditional marketing, digital
marketing is affordable and allows brands to target directly their desired audience. Not only
can they share information with their consumers, digital marketing also provides direct
feedback and communication between the company and the client (Pessala, 2016). This allows
brands to build relationships and a customer-driven approach with their clients as they know
what they want and can, then, customize products or services (Agam, 2017).
A very important and useful tool that came with digital marketing is social media. With
millions of new users across different online platforms, social media is a reliable source of
information where brands and customers can interact (Coelho et al, 2016; Xu & Pratt, 2018).
Between the many benefits of using such platforms, there is brand loyalty, perceived quality
and brand association which are all favorable for companies as it creates authenticity and
credibility in their brand (Callarisa et al, 2012). A sector that particularly benefits from it is
Tourism. Indeed, as the information come mainly from reviews or comments written by
previous tourists describing their experiences, it builds trust and influences customers to book
a trip or service. The different consumer-generated content as well as comments and opinions
online, enable customers to reduce their feelings of anxiety when making a purchasing
decision as they trust the source (Viglia et al, 2016).
One of the main online platforms for digital marketing is Instagram. Being the first
photo-based platform, the social media distinguished itself by allowing users to share their life
images. It became a persuasive and influential source of information for many users. Indeed,
Instagram allows companies to share different types of content such as sponsored, owned or
user-generated photos. Some of these are seen as more legitimate and credible than others
but are all used in a way by brands (Noone et al, 2011). Whether it is paid advertisement which
the company paid for consumers to see, own created content or photos posted by influencers,
users of social media who have acquired a wide audience and established credibility with high
reach and authenticity (Ristova & Angelkova, 2019), these campaigns all bring a different type
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of awareness to a brand. In the Tourism industry, user-generated content works best as it is
seen as unbiased by consumers.
However, it is important to determine the impact of different type of contents and

campaigns used on a brands’ feed to see if their strategy is good, to demonstrate its
effectiveness and make sure they can be held accountable for their success (Brennan, 2017).
The impact on consumers might change depending on different key performing indicators.
Indeed, many factors of success can be analyzed such as timing, topic, type of content and
more, to understand what truly is working for a specific company (Patel, 2017). For this thesis,
the case of the Six Senses group in Douro Valley is analyzed.
Six Senses Group is very well-known for its philosophy of sensibility, responsibility and
emotional hospitality which truly attracts guests to live the experience. Indeed, their many
resorts meet great success and the group is considered the pioneer in the use of sustainable
practices. With 4 Awards, Douro Valley is meeting a great success in Portugal and attracts very
luxurious guests (Lima, 2019). Their online presence is undeniable; with over 42,800 followers
(see appendix I) and one post published per day every day, but also numerous stories shared
either by influencers or guests, Six Senses Douro Valley shows good results with its marketing
strategy. The evaluation of the impact of their campaigns is necessary to strengthen them and
demonstrate their success (Patel, 2017; Brennan, 2017). Which leads to the following research
question: How to determine the impact of Instagram Campaigns in the Six Senses Group in
Douro Valley?
The thesis is divided into six chapters, starting with a theoretical background of the
main subjects discussed in this paper. Then, there is the context of the research question with
its analysis of Six Senses Douro Valley Instagram use, followed by the objectives of this
research. Chapter three; methodology, is the detailed procedure put in place by the author to
determine how to answer the research question. Following is the presentation of the results
with an explanation of the data collected, which will then be analysed as well as interpreted
by the researcher in chapter five. To finish off, chapter six is a discussion of the results with
the intervention of the expert from the marketing team and recommendations for Six Senses
Douro Valley according to the obtained results regarding their marketing strategy.
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Chapter 1. Theoretical Background
In this section, the researcher develops her findings on the main themes of this thesis.
Indeed, so there can be a better understanding of the research question for the reader, a
background exploration on the following subjects; the beginning of digital marketing as well
as its impact, Instagram and influencers, but also Six Senses Douro Valley, the studied location,
are all necessary to get more familiarized with the topic.
1.1 Digitalized Marketing and Why it Became so Important
For a business to promote its services or products and create brand awareness, it must
use marketing especially in this very competitive environment (Pessala, 2016). Traditional
forms of marketing have been employed for years and consist of printed media, television,
radio, flyers and many more. If these tools proved themselves to be useful and successful,
they are also high-priced and do not engage enough with the targeted public (Nayar, 2018).
With the growth in information and communication technology, but also the emergence of
digital marketing, it is opening up a world that allows free flow of information to customers
(Alic et al, 2017). Potential consumers are not reading newspapers or watching TV anymore,
instead, they are on online platforms. To reach them, companies need to follow the trends
and be up to date by determining what are the new most profitable channels for online
marketing and advertising. It is undeniable that online marketing is becoming a standard and
if companies wish to stay relevant in a myriad of competitors, they need to stand out and
make use of this new tool (Pessala, 2016).
As explained by Cox et al. (2009), the term Web 2.0 refers to the second generation of
web-based services that have gained massive popularity by letting people collaborate and
share information online in previously unavailable ways. Indeed, as traditional media presents
a one-way communication, digital marketing allows the business and the customer to
communicate in ways they could not before (Ge & Gretzel, 2018). Businesses can, therefore,
move from a company-driven strategy to a customer-driven one since they have direct
feedback and can customize products, services, and messages to please consumers without
high-costs (Agam, 2017). While the impact of traditional channels is dropping, digital media is
on the rise. This growth also has an impact on consumers who are becoming more educated
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as media users and more critical when seeing advertisements (Biaudet, 2017). To quote Singh
& Sonnenburg (2012), the emergence of social media has changed the consumers’ role in
storytelling from passive listening to a more active participant.
Social media (SM) is being recognized as a tool that marketers are including in their
strategy as customers rely on those platforms to interact with each other and with brands
(Coelho et al, 2016). As defined by Noone et al (2011), SM refers to a group of internet-based
platforms that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content as well as
comments, opinions on a brand. The platforms are about sharing personal experiences often
with photos or videos which provides a sense of authenticity and credibility (Alic et al, 2017).
It is also about enabling conversations among an audience or a market, and most importantly
about building relationships (Booth & Matic, 2011). SM is growing at a staggering pace and
attracting millions of new users across various online platforms (Xu & Pratt, 2018). With so
many new users, it is also generating comments and reviews which provide greater
effectiveness in the communication process of a brand’s goods and services, as well as
awareness in brand loyalty, perceived quality and brand association (Callarisa et al, 2012). This
is particularly desirable for companies as, unlike traditional advertising, it generates more
authenticity and credibility, leading to lower resistance to the message (De Veirman et al,
2017).
1.1.1 Social Media Revolutionized Business’ Interactions
With the constant connectivity between people thanks to social media, marketers
have started to invest more money as well as time on online platforms to drive customer
behavior and create more brand awareness. If it is advised that companies keep using
traditional marketing, they also need to familiarize themselves with new social media for
marketing as it is the most effective method for customers to spread their opinions. This way,
they can find how to maximize their communication through interactive media so that, in the
end, they can reach out to their customers (Kim et al, 2015). Nonetheless, by communication,
it does not only mean using social media as online distribution but as an effective tool
performing service recovery, developing relationships with customers and building brand
loyalty within the community (Chan & Guillet, 2011).
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All these changes with the internet are giving more power to consumers who decide
how they want to share information and how it is used on social media. Indeed, they are the
ones creating content and distributing information about businesses (Callarisa et al, 2012). As
developed by Barreda & Bilgihan (2013), the image of a business is no longer under the
company’s management, it is decided by the customers. For businesses to have some control,
they must establish highly effective methods to build and engage with their audience on social
media. The key is to use well social media and target the audience (Ristova & Angelkova,
2019). Another important point is building relationships which leads to loyalty and aims at
returning customers (Chatzigeorgiou, 2017). However, as Singh & Sonnenburg (2012)
proceeded, targeting the audience and building relationships is not enough, companies also
need to develop relationships among consumers. It was proved in a study from 2013, that 69%
of consumers would trust a recommendation from online customers or friends and family,
which is significantly higher than the percentage of consumers that would trust traditional
television or magazines in the 2000s (Xu & Pratt, 2018). Therefore, by having customers
expressing their opinion, it affects the decisions of others (Senić, 2018). To sum-up, the
explosive growth of social media has changed how consumers interact with each other, but
also, how they communicate with businesses of all kinds (Leung & Stahura, 2015).
1.1.2 Impact of Social Media on Tourism
As one of the most powerful networking tools, social media is integrated into the social
and economic life of any individual (Senić, 2018). Indeed, social media has become essential
for social networking and content sharing (Rebelo, 2017). Not only that, but it has also become
a critical source of information for many sectors, but especially for tourism as it shapes
travelers’ perspective when they are in the research phase of planning their holiday (Cox et
al, 2009). Since tourism is an information-intense industry (Xiang & Gretzel, 2010), travelers
need a place where they can find all the information at once. Internet services have proved to
be a key factor in the increasement of efficiency and promotion when it comes to tourist
products worldwide and at a low cost (Stiakakis & Vlachopoulou, 2017). Due to the large
variety of social media websites, travelers can find different consumer-generated content, as
listed by Xiang & Gretzel (2010) in blogs, virtual communities, social networks, collaborative
tagging and media files shared on YouTube.
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As explained by Stiakakis & Vlachopoulou (2017), tourism is one of the major industries
that are directly related to information and communication technology development.
Companies in the sector must understand how consumers search and review the information
during the various stages of their travel planning (Cox et al, 2009). Social media has become
the preferred marketing channel for tourism organizations and has been also adopted by
tourists (Femenia-Serra & Gretzel, 2020). Customers are not passive anymore, they are active
participants and co-creators of information, offering value. For this reason, tourism suppliers
have to change their strategy from customer-centric to customer-driven which puts travelers
in control and empowers them to design, co-produce and co-promote their experiences
(Sigala & Gretzel, 2017). It has led to the creation of user-generated content (UGC), which is
one of the most prominent forms of electronic word of mouth (eWOM) (Femenia-Serra &
Gretzel, 2020). And since there is an exponential increasement of UGC on social media
platforms (Callarisa et al, 2012), touristic enterprises such as hotels need to realize that
exposure on SM can help create strong brand awareness and enhance the chances of bookings
by increasing eWOM advertising (Kim et al, 2015).
In 2012, consumer blogs were the most researched on social media for tourism as they
would contain product and service reviews (Callarisa et al, 2012; Hudson & Thal, 2013),
proving that online UGC replaced professional reviewers. Indeed, online content helps
customers inform themselves about searching, travel planning and purchase decisions (Vigla
et al, 2016). Furthermore, one of the great aspects of SM networks is that it provides support
during the consumer decision-making process. Therefore, if the traveler has any questions or
doubts, they can interact directly either with the brand or other formers consumers of a
product or service. Recommendations of other consumers who have prior experience with a
tourism product are the most influential and preferred sources for travel decision making
(Barreda & Bilgihan, 2013). In brief, social media inspires trust (Chatzigeorgiou, 2017), and
even if it cannot control the conversations among consumers, it can influence them. Influence
is the foundation on which all economically viable relationships are built (Booth & Matic,
2011). However, with SM, travelers can also use it to evaluate the alternatives and to compare
and contrast different destinations (Terttunen, 2017).
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Another good aspect of social media and how it impacts Tourism is that destinations
marketers can use online platforms before they travel to inspire, inform and engage with
customers. Then, during the travel to facilitate at the destination and finally, after the holiday
so they can remember their experience, share and engage (Senić, 2018). This way, potential
customers can get a full picture of the whole decision stage and experience of other
consumers. As finalized by Alic et al. (2017), content created on a trip or vacation gets easily
posted for everyone to see, creating then a strong impact on people who follow it.
1.1.3 Importance of eWOM in the Hotel Industry
Social media has proved to be of big importance in the online tourism domain (Xiang
& Gretzel, 2010). Its explosive growth truly has changed the way travelers interact with each
other, but more importantly with hospitality businesses (Leung & Bai, 2013). As Kim et al.
(2015) reported, eWOM is one of the most salient information sources that customers use
when making purchasing decisions in the hospitality and tourism industry. Electronic word-of-
mouth, which comes from word-of-mouth, means consumers who spread their experiences
online. This way, they can offer information and recommendations to other customers (Viglia
et al, 2016). Due to the credibility of eWOM, hotels noticed that positive content in online
reviews increased the number of hotel rooms booked as it affected consumers’ behaviors such
as purchasing intention and product purchasing (Kim et al, 2015). Barreda & Bilgihan (2013)
highlighted that comments are considered to be more up-to-date and credible information.
For this reason, hotels are incorporating social media into their marketing strategy (Leung et
al, 2015). Managers in the hospitality domain need to measure the effectiveness of their brand
to remain competitive (Callarisa et al, 2012). As a matter of fact, they should strive to
understand how reviews posted online affect consumer decision-making and how it affects
their hotel’s performance (Viglia et al, 2016).
Another point that was observed is that consumers tend to not trust marketing
messages from companies. They are more influenced by other customers as they consider
traveler recommendations on SM more credible (Barreda & Bilgihan, 2013). A similar message
is perceived as more authentic when it comes from a consumer, than when it is put forward
by an advertiser (De Veirman et al, 2017). Recent studies mentioned by Chatzigeorgiou (2017),
revealed that consumers believe recommendations over all forms of advertising and has
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proved to trigger 11 times more ROI than other forms of advertising. Consumers are
constantly on the search for comments and opinions which has been identified as a way to
reduce feelings of anxiety when making a purchase decision (Viglia et al. 2016). Additional
researches also prove that 70% of consumers reported online customer reviews as the second
most trusted source (Walker, 2018). Therefore, hoteliers must have a presence on the
internet; it is very important for its success and also, thanks to the development of information
and communication technology which enabled eWOM, hotels are managing to engage with
guests and building strong and personalized relationships (Milović, 2012).
1.2 Instagram’s Rise to Success
There are many social media platforms available for businesses, but Instagram truly
has made it easier for hotels to target specific markets based on different factors such as age,
location, gender and interests (Ristova & Angelkova, 2019). Instagram stands out due to its
fast-growing by becoming, in 2010, the first photo-based social media platform. Founded by
Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, it reached 1 million users in two months only (Rebelo, 2017),
and is today the most downloaded free app in the Apple app store with 1 billion people using
it every month (Newberry, 2019). Its popularity is mainly due to how easy it is for consumers
to share their lives with others and how convenient it is for brands to share their products or
services with an audience (Terttunen, 2017).
Concentrated on visual communication, content on Instagram has been elected the

platform with the highest engagement (Terttunen, 2017). In 2016, the application was hailed
the “king of customer engagement” (Pessala, 2016) after it was proven that its engagement
with brands was 10 times higher than Facebook, 54 times higher than Pinterest and 84 times
higher than Twitter (Rebelo, 2017). Since the platform has become the fastest growing online
photo social web where users share their life images with other users and where they spend
most of their time compared to other similar sites, it has grown to become a persuasive and
influential information source (Djafarova & Rushworth, 2017).
However, some still see Instagram as a photo-based social network for selfie-obsessed
adolescents (Miles, 2013). When, on the contrary, many clear facts identify the benefits for
brands, such as the following numbers: 200 million Instagram users visit at least one business
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profile daily, Instagram’s potential advertising reach is 849.3 million users and one-third of the
most viewed stories are from businesses (Newberry, 2019), which show that brands have
great visibility and awareness on the platform. Actually, there is a growing interest amongst
marketers to use Instagram for advertising (Djafarova & Rushworth, 2017). With many
features such as Instagram Direct Message, businesses can truly interact and build
relationships with customers (Varma et al, 2004). Not only that but by realizing that there is a
real potential on Instagram, there has been a growth in Influencers as a profession since many
companies are now evaluating their potential as well (Nandagiri & Philip, 2018).
On visually appealing platforms like Instagram, the work of an influencer is more

observed (Nandagiri & Philip, 2018). Abidin (2016) described them as a form of microcelebrity
who accumulated a following on blogs and social media through the textual and visual
narration of their personal, everyday lives, but also advertisements are written in the form of
editorial opinions for products and services. They represent a third-party endorser that
influences an audience through the use of social media (Freberg et al, 2011). Moreover, they
play a growing and important role in word-of-mouth marketing as they can lead to impact and
persuade in interaction with their following and due to their credibility as well as authenticity
(Ristova & Angelkova, 2019). Indeed, collaborations and community have become the most
important characteristics of the internet (Barreda & Bilgihan, 2013).
1.2.1 Impact of Influencers on Touristic Companies
It is more common for influencers to post about fashion, food or even parenting, but
there are also those classified as more of “lifestyle” content. Those are posts related to their
own life and allows consumers to identify themselves better (Rebelo, 2017). These days, social
media influencers are a hot topic in the hotel industry as it is a part of the “lifestyle” content.
Seen as a non-traditional mean of advertising, influencers helped changing the hotel industry
and offered guests an authentic experience and advices when making purchasing decisions
(Ristova & Angelkova, 2019). The role of an influencer is a key factor in marketing (Xiong &
Hu, 2010), as they represent a major aspect in e-commerce, they are the most appropriate
strategy for marketing experts and hoteliers to guarantee a credible and realistic strategy. As
it was mentioned previously, guests are more willing to choose a hotel based on reviews, in
this case, they look up to influencers to guide them with their decision making (Ristova &
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Angelkova, 2019). Also, travel destinations’ promotion is more effective with a visual
presentation, this being the reason why Instagram is the perfect SM to promote them as
customers enjoy following influencers’ experience with the most details (Alic et al. 2017). If
international hotel firms are using mainly influencer marketing, destinations are also doing so
but, still lagging (Femenia-Serra & Gretzel, 2020).
Instagram influencer partnerships were identified as the best performing to reach new
audiences quickly with an average of 3.21% engagement rate compared to 1.5% on other
similar social networks (Later, 2020). Influencers are the fastest growing method to target an
audience (Ristova & Angelkova, 2019), therefore, businesses are investing the majority of their
budgets in marketing, on influencers since, when it is done right, it truly works (Later, 2020).
Indeed, there are different levels of Influencers based on their ability to influence others and
their followings. As analyzed by Walker (2018), 82% of consumers are more likely to be
influenced by a micro-influencers and mid-tier influencers which get the highest engagement
rates. Also, 40% of people admitted buying a product or service after seeing it on an
influencer’s Instagram.
Figure 1: Different levels of Influencers by Later (2019)
Nonetheless, if a hotel wants to make the best of its investment, it needs to choose its
influencers right. Indeed, influencers can be a waste of an investment if they are not chosen
properly. There are three key factors to ensure that the hotel has selected the proper
influencers: relevant, engagement and authentic. Ristova & Angelkova (2019) developed each
key factor and agreed that an influencer needs to be relevant to the hotel brand by his/her
style. He/she also needs to have loyal fans with a good engagement rate, but most
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importantly, needs to be authentic and not fake his/her experience. Influencers are content
creators and storytellers; they know how to create enthusiasm. The challenge for advertisers
is to select the most efficient and suitable influencer while keeping their service in
consideration to choose a coherent influencer (De Veirman et al, 2017).
1.2.2 Different Types of Instagram Content
Researchers have been trying to analyze which brand content results in terms of
numbers of comments, likes, and shares. If some say it depends on the media type, whether
it is a text, photo or video, others say it depends on the richness of the content and whether
it generates a positive influence on likes and comments (Coelho et al, 2016). But the question
is not only on the results; it also is about whether the content is legitimate and credible for
the consumers (Noone et al, 2011). As Nadagiri & Philip (2018) explained, influencer’s content
is more preferred than advertisements as it is more elaborated and unbiased. Customers will
most likely trust influencers than the brand itself since they are more likable and authentic,
and most importantly, the customer has decided to follow them voluntarily to get inspiration
(Ristova & Angelkova, 2019).
1.2.2.1 Sponsored Content
Sponsored content refers to paid media/advertisement which is generated and paid

by the company itself. The content is then displayed on the platform that the brand paid for
and appears on the newsfeed of potential customers (Mattke et al, 2019). But people have
become more skeptical of advertisements; they lost trust in brands and do not enjoy the
constant marketing advertising. Indeed, paid advertisement is no longer effective and now
more than ever, brands need to change their strategies to connect with consumers (Zosso,
2016). As most consumers avoid paid media, others find them informative, entertaining and
credible (Mattke et al, 2019).
1.2.2.2 Owned Content
For a more positive image, companies use their own created content that they post on
their social media directly. It gives consumers a more positive brand attitude and shows
development in loyalty as well as an influence on consumer’s purchase behavior (Mattke et
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al, 2019). A great way that companies found to engage with customers is through emotions
(Fractl, 2019). As Pasquereau (2020) explained, sometimes what makes content so special is
how it makes people feel. Whether it is funny, cringy or sad, there is a need to share the
emotional experience with others. Storytelling provides meaning to a brand and it is a way for
consumers to truly connect with companies and their philosophies. Indeed, it helps consumers
have a clearer idea of the brands’ actions, attitudes, and characters which creates then both
empathy and recognition towards the company (Singh & Sonnenburg, 2012). The problem
with owned content is that for companies, it requires a big commitment of resources, time
and money. Also, it is not always as authentic and creative as other forms (Walker, 2020).
1.2.2.3 User-Generated Content
The impact of user-generated content is very important in the Tourism world; it

changes the traveler’s information searching and travel planning behaviors. They trust other
consumer’s experiences more as they see their opinion as unbiased and trustful when in the
decision-making of their travels (Barreda & Bilgihan, 2013).
UGC defines any form of content being generated online by platform users (Shuqair &
Cragg, 2017). Therefore, even if most of the time, UGC comes from normal consumers, it can
also be generated by an influencer. Indeed, they share self-generated content such as pictures
or videos related to the brand for their followers to see. This method is seen as more credible
and trustworthy than sponsored content as they are sharing their honest opinions (Mattke et
al, 2019). Also, influencer-generated content is faster to create and cheaper for the company,
but most importantly, it performs better than owned content created directly by brands
(Walker, 2020). Finally, influencer marketing delivers content that can be reused later by the
company on its feed with the permission of the influencer (Ristova & Angelkova, 2019).
In the Tourism industry, consumers seek unbiased and unregulated information, that
is why UGC is a major source of information for them (Gunasekar & Sudhakar, 2019).
Influencers are the new generation of reviewers that can provide a real-life experience
through user-generated content on Instagram. Nonetheless, followers can recognize when
influencers get paid by the brands and instead of delivering UGC, they deliver sponsored
content. Consumers then identify their content as not authentic (Ristova & Angelkova, 2019).
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1.2.3 Instagram Campaigns Efficiency
A marketing campaign is a way to promote a service or product with interactive

techniques. Usually designed to generate brand awareness, those campaigns can also have
other goals such as introducing a service, increase sales or simply create an impact (Tarver,
2019). Rebelo’s (2017) studies revealed some facts on how efficient Instagram was when
promoting a business. Indeed, it showed that at least 50% of the users on the platform follow
at least one business, over 500 000 advertisers are using it and finally, 70% of the campaigns
made on Instagram generated a significant boost for online conversion. These are valid
numbers for businesses of all sizes; start-ups or multinationals have all seen notable results
from their Instagram campaigns (Pessala, 2016).
To truly measure and identify the results, Dorfman (2015) gave a list of different
aspects to closely analyze: outputs, outcomes, and business results. He started with the
outputs; it helps to measure the success in gaining awareness and developing relationships
with the targeted influencers. The metrics include the following: influencer mentions of a
campaign, influencer shares of campaign-related assets such as content, links, etc., brand
mentions, engagement of the influencer. Once the outputs are analyzed to see whether the
influencer was invested in the campaign, the outcomes can also be examined which consists
of noting the impact on the targeted audience in terms of generating awareness and
recognition. For this second measure, the metrics include influencer-driven traffic to
campaign website or social media, brand mention from followers, new following and
influencer-driven traffic. And last but not least, the business results to see the impact on the
actual brand. It includes the opportunities created from an influencer campaign and the
revenue generated from it.
1.3 Six Senses Douro Valley’s Vision
Founded in the ‘90s in Bangkok, the Six Senses group had for objective to build
luxurious hotels with high sustainability awareness. Their very strong vision and brand values
led them to become the hotelier group with the most sustainable practices (Lima, 2019). Local
sensitivity, global sensibility, responsible and caring, as well as emotional hospitality just to
mention a few of their honorable values, enabled them to receive that title (Six Senses, 2018).
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Strong human interactions attract customers since it brings high value to the way clients are
received and treated; their experience is truly valued as a whole (Lima, 2019).
After Six Senses resorts opened all over Asia, the founders wanted to reach a new
clientele. Six Senses Douro Valley was the first resort to open outside the Asian continent; it
was built in the south of the Douro River in the middle of vineyards, classified since 2001 as a
World Heritage Site by UNESCO (Lima, 2019). The group recognizes its role in the
environmental protection of this Portuguese region. Indeed, it protects a four-hectare
woodland on the property and has set numerous sustainable goals such as the complete
elimination of plastic (Mowery, 2019). Six Senses is very proud of the group’s philosophy and
is well-known in luxurious magazines for its involvement in sustainability and sustained
development. Also, their social responsibility is very active and present in the local region. The
hotel defends species in the surrounding such as donkeys, a symbol in the region of Douro,
and is also known for the cleaning of the streets and river (Lima, 2019). This is the image Six
Senses Douro Valley (SSDV) has and wants to keep.
If the brand is very well-known for its values, it is also very popular for its Spa facilities.
SSDV offers an incredible Spa featuring an indoor pool, gym, yoga rooms and many therapies
for their guests to feel as relaxed as possible (Mowery, 2019). To help people reconnect with
themselves, others and the world around them (Six Senses, 2018), is their vision and if above,
it is explained how to reconnect with the world around by being very involved with the local
region, the Spa is how SSDV wishes for their clients to reconnect with themselves. Also, the
property makes a great effort in incorporating organic and local products into therapies so
that customers stay fully connected with the region (Mowery, 2019).
The final part of their vision is to connect with others: the staff. The Six Senses’ group
employs mainly locals to emphasize on its philosophy of helping the region. If SSDV cares
deeply about its customers and always wants the best service delivered, it pays extra attention
to its employees. Clients’ reviews generally always involve a dedication to the very likable and
charming staff who know much about the area (Lussiana, 2015). As the training manager,
Sousa (2020), explained to offer a warm and almost family-like welcome to their guests, it is
important for the staff to feel at home and connected with their colleagues and working place.
The spirit of the employees truly inspires and helps guests to connect with others.
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1.3.1 SSDV Usage of Social Media
As Sousa (2020) explained, one of the objectives when receiving guests, is to offer
them a relaxing experience and a wide variety of activities to join so they will not think of using
their smartphones. She continued by describing how everyone is absorbed by all the
information delivered on social media and how SSDV wants to distinguish itself from it.
The marketing of SSDV is very present; the hotel is featured on every social media and
posts every single day of the week. Their favorite platform, however, remains Instagram as it
is the social media where guests are the most active and they can search for user-generated
content. To distinguish themselves from other hotels’ marketing, the marketing department
aims for a more sustainable and storytelling content. Indeed, the team creates once a month
a story that is established by the marketing team in London, who gives directives to every
resort of the group. These tasks have for goal to create a story unique to the region of the
resort and connect with the guests (Cerqueira, 2020).
Figure 2: Screenshot from the official SSDV Instagram of February’s storytelling of Douro's tradition "Croça"
Stories create and enhance connections with the brand by proving a theme of
conversation between customers and the brand itself (Singh & Sonnenburg, 2012). This is a
strategy for guests to feel connected with the region by bringing awareness, comprehension,
empathy, and meaning to SSDV. Indeed, as Pasquereau (2020) highlighted, the creation of
emotional experience is crucial for success, and that, SSDV develops very well with its online
15
presence. Social media truly is the most effective way to communicate and spread
information. For a destination, it helps increase the interest of potential guests by showing
the benefits of a particular hotel and differentiate it from others (Senić, 2018).
1.3.1.1 How They Proceed with Influencers
As discussed earlier, influencer marketing has grown drastically and has become part
of many brand’s strategies. If some companies establish different ways to approach
influencers, SSDV does not need it. Indeed, the hotel gets daily demands from influencer to
collaborate with them in exchanges of services. The luxurious establishment refuses any type
of paid or sponsored content as they do not proceed to pay any of the microcelebrities coming
to their resort (Cerqueira, 2020). However, they are open to receiving them by offering them
discounts and some free services such as a free massage.
This strategy gets them UGC; influencers deliver professional-looking content that the
brand can then repost and use for diverse occasions. Influencers usually charge less when the
brand only asks for photos (Walker, 2018). In this case, they are not even paid, but as Walker
(2018) explained, they are willing to work for free when they love the brand and when it is
valuable products or services. The hotel is luxurious and expensive, a discount is usually
accepted by the influencers who, in return will also gain exposure from the brand which
already has a large following. This exposure can be as rewarding for an influencer, as for the
hotel and with no costs on both sides (Walker, 2018; Guilleux, 2020).
If the hotel is open to working with influencers, they appropriately choose them. For a
campaign to be successful, the celebrity endorser needs to match the destination (Xu & Pratt,
2018). As Cerqueira (2020), the Marketing Communications Coordinator SSDV, described,
they usually choose influencers whose content seems authentic and with stories. They will
favorize an account with photos of landscapes rather than selfies. Another important aspect
is that they need to truly understand and embrace the philosophy of the hotel. Therefore, if
an influencer shows their sustainability interest and actions on their feed, it is a perfect match
for the hotel. A good match-up between the endorser and the service should lead to a more
positive perception of the advertisement, which leads consumers to have a more positive
attitude toward the brand (Xu & Pratt, 2018).
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Figure 3: Screenshot of American influencer, Ana Politan, telling the story about how the hotel adopts street dogs in the region, on her
Instagram
The different topics discussed give an idea of how efficient Instagram can be when
promoting a brand and what usually works in terms of content according to various sources,
but also about SSDV’s strategy. Therefore, this theoretical background enables the researcher
to have key information regarding the research question how to determine the impact of
Instagram Campaigns in the Six Senses Group in Douro Valley, to be developed further in next
chapter.
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Chapter 2. Research Question
The following chapter helps to develop and analyze the current situation of Six Senses
Douro Valley Instagram presence and how it evolved to what it is today. Their strategy is
discussed and then, to finalize, the objectives of this research are established.
2.1 SSDV Analysis
On the 17th of February 2015, Six Senses Douro Valley posted its first photo promoting
the opening of the hotel. Their online presence, at the time, did not seem professional as most
photos were of poor quality and were not properly showing the hotel’s potential. As of August
2017, SSDV’s posts started to appear with more quality and in harmony with the philosophy
of the hotel as posts such as “sleep tips” would be shared. By the end of that year, the account
seems to be getting more engagement from followers as their likes and comments increased.
Several strategies started to be noticed on the hotel’s campaigns, such as the usage of
hashtags. Indeed, they use many tags including the two main ones that allow guests, not
following their account, to see their publications: #SixSenses and #SixSensesDouroValley, and
even #EatWithSixSenses when the photo involves food. Another strategy highlighted is the
description of the posts which seems very inviting or sometimes, motivates guests to answer
a question, therefore, creating engagement with the photo. Also, some photos from guests
were shared with the credits mentioned in the description.
Figure 4: Screenshot from SSDV’ account of own content
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Figure 5: Screenshot from SSDV account sharing a photo from a guest
With only one day of difference in posting, both publications show a large gap in terms
of likes. It could be explained with the fact that both campaigns show a very different type of
topic since in one there is a bottle of wine and in the other a sunset. Another argument could
be that one is their own content and the other is user generated. Or, to go further into details,
the text in the caption could be analyzed as being more inviting and the other is a question
for the guests. One thing is sure, after the success of their sunset photo, SSDV continued
sharing more UGC at the start of 2018. It is also at that time that their Instagram account grew
drastically and gathered numerous of likes as well as new followers (Cerqueira, 2020).
Coincidence or not, SSDV kept posting both own and user-generated content which
seemed to be successful in different ways. The marketing team even started a hashtag
#YesSixSenses to ask for permission to post guests’ photos. This hashtag is used by every resort
of the Six Senses group when requesting photos but does not apply to professional
photographers or influencers. Indeed, even though it is still considered UGC, the hotel has a
contract for those microcelebrities which highlights their ownership of every photo posted by
those parties. It is a sort of exchange of services since the hotel, in return, offers either
discounts or free services to those guests during their stay. This way, SSDV is ensured to have
enough content to publish each day of the week (Cerqueira, 2020).
19
As for sponsored content, the account has never paid for any of its campaigns. All the
engagement is organic and authentic which, as mentioned earlier in the theoretical
background, creates trust with their followers.
Figure 6: Screenshot from SSDV asking for permission to post a photo with #YesSixSenses hashtag
Essentially, their strategy mainly focuses on posting either owned or user-generated

content with different topics such as dog, pool, food, and rooms. These have been analyzed
by the Marketing Communications Coordinator as their most successful posts. To be more
precise, the dog is Aqua, their mascot, who was rescued and adopted by the hotel and lives
there. She welcomes guests and truly becomes a part of their experience. SSDV managed to
create an emotional story and move clients who love to share her and show some love to
every post featuring Aqua. Then, the pool is a beautiful feature of the hotel where guests love
to enjoy the view and good weather. Also, the food is known due to the excellent Chefs and
beautiful dishes inspired by the region. Finally, the rooms all have Portuguese features that
guests love to comment on.
These are all observations from the marketing team in charge of promoting the
Instagram of SSDV. If it shows great knowledge on the subject as well as a strong strategy, a
real analysis has not been done to determine the real impact of the campaigns led by SSDV.
For this reason, this research will focus on their campaigns starting from the first of January
20
2019 until the 31st of December 2019 to analyze and determine whether or not their strategy
is correct and is having the desired impact.
Figure 7: Screenshot from SSDV’s photo of Aqua and its numerous comments
2.2 Objectives of the Research
As it was previously discussed and highlighted by Brennan (2017), it is important to

determine the impact of different types of content and campaigns to see if their strategy is
good, to demonstrate its effectiveness, and make sure they can be held accountable for their
success. To do so and develop the best approach, three objectives have been set:
1. Create an approach to measure the impact of Instagram Campaigns

2. Identify what were the key factors of success
3. Recommend ways to improve Instagram Campaigns
These objectives are necessary for guidance in the creation of a good methodology and
process to then, gather the results, analyze and interpret them, to finally answer the research
question.
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Chapter 3. Methodology
This new chapter explains the process followed by the author to answer the research
question while respecting the objectives set. The theoretical background helped to better
understand Instagram’s success and different aspects that can be used to promote a brand.
Also, it gave a clearer idea of the variety of content that can be posted by companies on the
platform. That knowledge allows the researcher to develop an approach that will be able to
measure and determine the impact of SSDV’s campaigns.
3.1 Different Steps
First of all, the analysis features 414 posts starting from the 1st of January 2019 till the
31st of December 2019 which have been gathered by the author from SSDV’s Instagram
account. These are all placed on a grid with different key factors of the publication such as the
following: content producer, author, number of followers, month, day, topic, people,
description, hashtags, likes, and comments. Other key performing indicators like timing or
budget are not be featured as SSDV always posts at 8:30 p.m. and there is no budget involved
in their publications. Differentiating the publications by those key factors helps to understand
whether there is a link in the success of their campaigns and what aspects are the most
efficient.
Second of all, to make sure the author’s analysis is relevant, she asked three colleagues
to conduct the same analysis of the key factors mentioned above of only the top 10 photos
collected in terms of likes. Their results are a way to support the researcher’s findings.
Third of all, after finalizing the grid with all the necessary key factors involved, a
descriptive analysis is created with the help of Excel. Indeed, this method allows a better
description of the basic features of the data collected by summarizing it. As explained by Laerd
Statistics (2018) and by Trochim (2020), raw data is hard to visualize and interpret, therefore,
by doing a descriptive analysis it helps to create a meaning which can then be interpreted. For
this reason, all the gathered quantitative data is presented in descriptive statistics to be
simplified and easier to interpret by the author.
22
Also, to complete the analysis, an understanding of the relationship between the
different factors, variables, is needed. For this reason, cross tables are created to determine
the correlations from one variable to another. Indeed, after creating more visual results, it is
important to examine the relationships within the data. This method has different benefits
such as a simple method of grouping variables to minimize the confusion or error in
interpreting the data and also gives great insights into the raw data (Amuyunzu, 2019).
Then, thanks to the methods mentioned above, the results presented can be
interpreted to help determine, for example, what type of topic or content producer gets the
most likes/comments. All the key factors added to the grid are analyzed to understand
whether there is a relationship between the variables.
To finish off, the top 10 photos in terms of likes, sorted directly on the main grid, are
furtherly analyzed with the Instagram tool insights to see the generated interactions such as
profile visits, replies in private messages, website clicks, or follows. These results are essential
to fully measure whether the posts have an impact on the hotel’s Instagram.
Finally, after analyzing and interpreting those publications thanks to the grid created
to measure the impact and the different methods generated with Excel, but also, the
Instagram insights, some recommendations can be given. Improvements can be discussed
with the marketing team of Six Senses Douro Valley during an interview led by the author.
After presenting the finale results, the expert will be able to truly identify whether or not their
campaigns, as well as their marketing strategy in general, have the desired impact on the hotel
and their online reputation.
3.2 Preparation of the Grid
As a way of measuring the impact of SSDV’s campaigns and reach the first objective
set above, the author created this grid table (table 1) which features posts from 1 to 414,
classified from the oldest (1st of January) to the latest (31st of December) and the different
factors that are relevant to the photo. Every post was screenshot from SSDV’s account by the
author and numbered from 1 to 414 in a folder.
23
Table 1: Grid created on Excel by the author
24
3.2.1 Content Producer
The first factor to analyze in each of the posts is the credits. Indeed, every photo that
is used from guests or influencers is tagged and gives them the credit. As it was analyzed in
the theoretical background, there is a noticeable difference between own content and user-
generated content, therefore it is a very important factor to analyze and determine when
describing the 414 posts that were gathered.
Figure 8: Screenshot from SSDV's post giving credit to a UGC
The content used from Influencers is also separated in different levels of Influencers
determined by Later (2019) in Figure 1. These are important to differentiate since they are
considered to not all have the same type of influence as developed by Walker (2018). Indeed,
micro-influencers and mid-tier-influencers are identified as the most influential type of
Influencers, therefore, it is essential to differentiate them to then, analyze whether it is also
the case for Six Senses Douro Valley.
3.2.2 Account
As it was discussed previously, SSDV’s team asks photographers and influencers to

provide them with a good selection of photos in exchange for discounts or free services in the
hotel. This way, they can gather a good amount of media to publish on their page along the
25
days. For this reason, the same accounts can come out frequently in their publications. It is
interesting to see whether the account has an influence on the results presented.
3.2.3 Followers
An analysis of the followers, first of all, helps to identify the level for the Influencers,
but also, if a guest is important and has a good following base without necessarily being
famous. This analysis helps understanding whether posts get many likes due to the credit of
the guest/influencers or more by the nature of the photo.
3.2.4 Month
The hotel is open all year-round and its highest season starts in April until the end of
September. Therefore, those months generate more UGC and interest in general as guests
start getting excited about Summer and all the activities the hotel has to offer. However, as
explained by the Marketing Communications Coordinator (2020), that is also the period where
they have the least amount of time to handle social media properly in terms of engaging back
with their followers.
3.2.5 Day
SSDV is a very active page and posts every day. If they happen to miss one day, they
publish twice or more, on the following day. Thanks to this analysis, the team will be able to
see whether there is a link between a specific day of publication and their success.
3.2.6 Topic
The topic or the theme of the publication is very important. As a hotel, the page shares
a lot of content regarding the hotel’s facade, the landscape, specific features such as the pool
and the food, etc. There is a wide variety of topics that SSDV can share with its followers, but
some work better than others. Indeed, many sources have discussed the impact of different
contents posted on Instagram, but Later (2019) shared the image content performance on
Instagram of 2019 with the diverse image types that can be posted and their percentage of
26
engagement. The author based herself on these types of content and topics to classify the
photos published by SSDV’s account.
Figure 9: Image content Performance on Instagram by Later (2019)
3.2.7 People
Another factor related to the topic of the photos shared is whether or not people are
featured on the shots. As Allemand (2017) mentioned, the presence of people in a photo
depends on the activity presented. Indeed, when it comes to touristic shots, it does not usually
include people as it is mostly about monuments, leisure, streets, parks, etc. In the case of
SSDV, Cerqueira (2020) explained that when choosing UGC, they try to avoid shots where
people are too present. Indeed, they want the hotel to be the main attraction and not the
guest. However, they still like to feature shots with people on them as long as the hotel
remains the center of the photo.
3.2.8 Description
Each post contains an introductory text for the followers to identify themselves with
or feel something when reading the caption and want to double tap on the photo. There can
27
be different types of descriptions or captions, as they are called on Instagram. Influencers and
brands usually choose long descriptions to tell a story to their followers (Later, 2019).
However, SSDV prefers to use short and inviting captions to motivate followers into visiting
the hotel. Other means such as questions or tag a friend are also used which invites followers
to comment on the publication. Those types are all analyzed to see whether it influences the
success of the publications in terms of comments especially.
3.2.9 Hashtags
The platform has a limit of 30 hashtags per post and they are crucial. It is important to
use relevant and targeted hashtags to get discovered by new audiences but also branded
hashtags (Later, 2019). SSDV shares two branded hashtags #SixSenses and
#SixSensesDouroValley which are a way of inviting guests to share their own content with the
same hashtags, as it was already discussed earlier. The usage of hashtags has a great impact
on the engagement, and it is advised for brands to use 10+ on their posts as it was identified
as the most efficient in 2019. SSDV seems to vary the number of hashtags used depending on
the topic of the post. Therefore, this analysis will allow a better understanding of the success
of a post with hashtags.
Figure 10: How Instagram Hashtags Impact Engagement by Later (2019)
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3.3 Data Analysis Process
By analyzing the posts in terms of likes and comments, it enables to see what type of
content and topic satisfies the most the followers, and which one generates the most
conversation. Indeed, both are important since likes show the clients’ appreciation of the
photo, but comments describe their feelings towards the hotel and what they are seeing.
After creating both the descriptive analysis and cross table, the results are interpreted,
and their similarities discussed. Indeed, the point is to see what type of content and topic is
the most appreciated and by whom it is generated, whether the day or month has an influence
but also if the number of hashtags has an impact.
Then, the interpretation is compared to what was analyzed in the theoretical

background and determined as successful by diverse sources, but also, it is discussed with the
Marketing team to understand whether the results reflect their digital strategy or not. If it is
not the case, then some recommendations based on what was interpreted can be given to
have a constant success with the publications of SSDV.
Finally, the analysis of the insights of the top 10 posts in terms of likes, sorted on the
main grid, helps to determine the impact of the posts on the actual platform. This method
allows the researcher to see what type of actions was taken by the guests on the publication
of the account and therefore, see whether there was an impact in terms of interactions.
Table 2: Grid created on Excel by the author, Top 10 Likes
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Figure 11: Screenshot from SSDV’s analytics, sorting the top liked photos
3.4 Others Analysis
To support the researcher’s grid and analysis, it was asked to three colleagues to
analyze the key factors of the top 10 photos that have been sorted in terms of likes in the
original grid created by the author. Those 10 photos (see appendix II) were sent to them with
a blank table and some information to be filled.
Some of the factors identified by the author are not featured in the grid sent to the
three individuals. Indeed, information such as month or day were not asked to analyze as
those are on the photo and are obvious. Followers and account are also not listed since it does
not require an analysis, simply a copy-paste of what is indicated.
30
Post Content Producer Topic People Description Hashtags
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Content Producer: is there a credit on the photo? Who produced that content?
Topic: what is the main theme of the photo?
People: is there anyone on the photo?
Description: what is the caption of the photo about? What do you feel when reading it?
Hashtags: how many hashtags are there?
Table 3: Grid created on Excel by the author for others analysis
The results are from:
- Christian Dal Busco; 23 years old, student in Psychology in Geneva

- Alexis Auchlin; 23 years old, student in Tourism in Sierre
- Aurélie Stampfli; 24 years old, student in Tourism in Sierre
Differences can be identified such as their studies, which match the research. Indeed,
with a student in psychology, the description can be analyzed with more feelings and a real
understanding of how it makes guests react. And studies in tourism can help identify the topic
presented in a photo more easily since there is a higher notion of marketing.
3.4.1 Christian Dal Busco Results
Table 4: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Christian Dal Busco
The elements highlighted in green are answers that match the authors’ analysis (shown
in table 2) while the red ones show the differences. If it is very similar, it can be observed that
the interpretation of the description was very deep. Some notions show that Dal Busco did
31
not like some of the techniques of “inviting” guests to feel connected to the hotel. However,
it was still recognized.
Also, the difference of content producers was not properly understood which can
maybe be explained by the difference in studies and a potential lack of knowledge in terms of
differencing types of content.
3.4.2 Alexis Auchlin Results
Table 5: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Alexis Auchlin
These results are almost a perfect match to the author’s analysis. Indeed, the only
difference that is noted is the mention of vineyards for one of the posts which is not a category
that the researcher has in her original grid. However, it can be argued that it is part of the
landscape/view of the hotel.
As for the description, the interpretation of the author is identical to Auchlin’s. Indeed,
she perceives the term “makes you want, want” as a confirmation to the invitation that SSDV
gives in their captions.
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3.4.3 Aurélie Stampfli Results
Table 6: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Aurélie Stampfli
Once again, the results observed in table 6 are very similar to the authors in table 2.
Some content producers and topics weren’t analyzed like the researcher, but overall, it is a
very good comparison. Just like in table 5, Stampfli uses the term “makes me want” which,
again, is interpreted as an acceptance to the invitation of the hotel’s descriptions.
Another thing that can be analyzed is that it is the first table where no people were
identified. Indeed, in the two previous tables, people were spotted in either post 5 or 6. In this
case, Stampfli, most likely, judged like the author and only noted people from a close distance
rather than a long distance.
3.4.4 Conclusion
Overall, the results are pretty similar. The biggest difference is the fact that several
topics were identified each time and even though the main theme noted by the author was
almost always mentioned, it is still confusing as there can be much information in only one
photo. The author also noted that the category Vineyards could have been a topic in her grid
since it came out in two of the tables.
Another detail concerning the photos, is the fact that the researcher only mentioned
people from a close distance and did not identify them from a long distance, as some of the
results presented show.
As for the content producer, the results are extremely similar apart from a few
exceptions. Also, the descriptions had some differences, but it seems as, in the end, the
interpretation was good and makes sense.
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Chapter 4. Presentation of Results
Moving to this new section, it presents the results obtained from the analysis achieved
by the author. The main grid (see appendix III), manually completed by the researcher, served
as a base for the analysis carried out. To simplify the very wide raw data, a descriptive analysis
is created with a histogram for better visuals. Also, the cross-tables help to identify the
correlation between variables for a better interpretation. Both of these methods can be
observed in more detail in appendix IV.
Some of the key factors identified in the main grid of analysis are not presented as the
results did not appear to be relevant to answer the research question. Only the data relevant
to this thesis is presented and analyzed.
4.1 Content Producer Results
In the interest of this research, the only interesting detailed information regarding who
is producing the content for SSDV is whether it is coming from a professional, someone
famous, or a normal guest. Indeed, no other information such as gender or age is taken into
consideration, only the type of content producer.
To determine the profile of who created the content published, the author based
herself on the credit given on the photo. Then, a quick tour of the account was needed to
identify who exactly the producer was. Often, influencers or photographers have a high
number of followers. Most of them also mention it directly on their biography which helped
to determine easily who they were. As for normal guests, usually, their account is private or
with very small followers which can easily indicate that they are not professionals.
The first histogram (table 7) shows the percentage of campaigns produced by either
guests, influencers, own content, or photographers. It can be noted that macro-influencers
produced only 1% of the account’s content, while photographers have provided 30% of the
hotel’s content.
As for the second (table 8), it represents the mean of likes by each content producer.
In this case, even though they have very little photos from macro-influencers, those represent
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the most liked posts on SSDV’s account. And the least liked appears to be their own produced
content which has a mean of only 406,26 likes. It is the same results for the mean of comments
also presented in table 8.
Table 7: Histogram created on Excel by the author
4.1.1 Content Producer Results Simplified
A simplified version was also created where every type of influencer is gathered under
one group to see whether it gives different results.
If table 9 shows the same results as above with influencers having the least amount of
posts featured on SSDV’s account and photographer’s the most, table 10 demonstrates that
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guests’ content has the highest mean of likes, as well as comments. The hotel’s own content
remains the type of content with the least means of likes, as well as comments.
4.2 Followers Results
The number of followers on someone’s account can be an indicator of whether they

are famous or influencers. However, more and more accounts seem to have high numbers of
followers without necessarily being considered influencers.
On table 11, it shows that most of SSDV posts are from users with between 10,000 to
49,999 followers while only 2,9% are from users with less than 100 followers. However, when
36
it comes to likes, users with less than 100 followers have a mean of 692,58 likes and represent
the type of accounts with the highest rate of likes.
Indeed, table 12 has the opposite results than the one above since the content coming
from the highest number of followers, is the one gathering the least mean of likes and
comments.
4.3 Month Results
The hotel seems to share a lot of content in September since it shows 11,1% of posts
and is the highest month, while February is the month with the least published photos. Those
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results can be observed in table 13, however, table 14, has once again, the opposite results in
terms of mean of likes and comments.
Indeed, even though there seems to be a lot of content shared in September, it is also
the month that gathers the lowest mean of likes and comments in the whole year. While
March and April show good results for likes and comments with a mean of 618,17 likes in April,
and a mean of 11,93 comments in March.
4.4 Day Results
Even though SSDV posts daily, it can be observed that some days of the week have a
higher amount of posts such as Sunday which shows 15,2% of content published on that day
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of the week, and Saturday with 12,6%, making it the lowest. If those numbers can be analyzed
in table 15, other results are presented in table 16, where Monday appears to be the day with
the highest mean of likes and comments with 615,22 likes and 12,59 comments. As for the
lowest day, it appears to be Friday with a mean of 465,90 likes and 7,54 comments.
4.5 Topic Results
Six Senses Douro Valley has many services to offer, therefore the topics represented
in photos vary. The author identified one main topic in each of the 414 posts, therefore, if a
photo showed diverse topics, she chose only the one that stands out the most or that was in
relation with the caption of the post.
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In those 414 posts, 18 topics were identified. In table 17, it can be noted that the topic
that was the most present was Landscape with 23,9% of posts published representing this
topic. As for the lowest, Donkeys, which are the mascot of the Douro Region, were featured
only 0,5%.
Then, in table 18, it shows completely different results by, for example, identifying Pool
and Spa Pool as the most liked and most commented topics on SSDV’s account. As for the
lowest, they both represent activities with Sports Activities representing the least mean of
likes, and Food Activities the least mean of comments.
4.5.1 Topics Results Simplified
To have clearer results to interpret, a simplified version of the topics is also created
with 8 groups regrouping common topics together. If the least present topic remains the same
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with the group of Animals and a % of 4,1, the one with the highest % is every topic that
revolves around F&B with a total of 26,6.
As for Table 20, it shows the same results as in table 18. Indeed, Activities represent
the topic with the lowest mean of both likes and comments, while the exterior Pool, which is
not grouped with Spa pool, indicates the highest mean of likes as well as comments.
4.6 People Results
The promotion of a hotel focuses more on the actual features of the place rather than
showcasing people. Therefore, it is interesting to analyze whether SSDV uses photos with
people on them or not.
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The results are very clear since both table 21 and table 22 demonstrate that there are
more photos used without people on them and that those are also the ones with the highest
mean of likes and comments.
4.7 Description Results
The description of a photo can help to get a reaction from the reader. With SSDV’s
publications, four types of descriptions were identified by the author. The results presented
in table 23 and table 24 are the perfect opposite.
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Indeed, Inviting captions are more present but have the lowest mean of likes and
comments, while Tag captions get the highest likes and comments even though they have a
percentage of only 4,1% presence in SSDV’s account.
4.8 Hashtags Results
Instagram has a limit of 30 hashtags per publications and it seems that SSDV’s posts
have very varied amounts of hashtags per posts. It can be seen in table 25 that posts with 0
hashtags are the most present in the account.
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However, when it comes to likes in table 26, posts with over 30 hashtags get the
highest mean of likes while posts with between 20 to 29 hashtags get the highest mean of
comments. As for the lowest mean, it can be observed in posts with 1 to 14 hashtags for
comments, and posts between 15 to 19 hashtags for likes.
4.9 Insights Results
This social media platform has a very detailed analytics system when it comes to
business accounts. Since SSDV is a professional profile, it is possible to access some important
information that helps understand whether a post had success and generated any sort of
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action such as sharing the post, saved it, visited the profile, checked the directions to the hotel,
clicked on the website, sent an e-mail, called or simply followed the account.
After sorting the top 10 most liked photos on the Six Senses Douro Valley account,
their insights (see appendix V) were analyzed and put in a grid (see appendix VI) which was
then, transformed into a descriptive analysis to better interpret the results.
Profile Visits appears to show the most actions taken in all the 10 posts. While calls are
barely visible in the histogram as there is extremely little use of this action. A lot of sharing
and saves can also be observed in table 27.
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Chapter 5. Analysis and Interpretation
Now that the results obtained by the author were presented in the chapter above, this
new one is an analysis as well as an interpretation of the results that have been gathered. As
the researcher was conducting the tables, she noticed a few elements that will also be
furtherly discussed in the following paragraphs. The goal is to understand the relationship
between variables and highlight what works the best in SSDV strategies to determine the
impact of their campaigns.
5.1 Best Content Producer Profile
It was identified in the theoretical background that influencers are a great way of
promoting a brand and also, a very successful tool on Instagram (Ristova & Angelkova, 2019).
If it can truly be seen that Macro-Influencers, despite their very low presence with only 1%,
are very successful in terms of likes and comments, they are not so successful when grouped
with all levels of influencers.
Indeed, after creating a simplified histogram regrouping every level of influencer, it

could be noted that they were no longer the most successful content producers. While, on the
other hand, guests show a high mean of likes and comments with only 21,5% of content
present on the account. Even more surprising, in terms of followers, it is the group of 0 to 100
followers that also gathers the highest mean of likes in SSDV’s account while followers from
10000 to 49999 have the lowest mean.
If these results do not match what was discussed in the theoretical background, it
appears to coincide with SSDV’s strategy. Indeed, earlier, it was mentioned that they do not
search for influencers to promote the hotel and when they are contacted, they only offer
discounts or services. This makes sense since the content provided appears to not be as
successful as the one from guests.
However, this interpretation does match with the fact that UGC generated by
customers is seen as more trustworthy and credible for followers (De Veirman et al, 2017).
And on the contrary, content too professional looking is not very authentic which can also be
identified with the highest % of presence being photographers’ content which shows an
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average mean of likes and comments. It was noted by the author that, most often, the photos
taken by photographers were related to the hotel’s activities which will be presented later on,
as the least interesting topic for followers.
As for its own content, it is the second most present content producer but not so
successful since it has the lowest mean of both likes and comments. The researcher did notice
that their own content was often repetitive with the use of the same photos throughout the
year. It can be explained by what was mentioned in the theoretical background; even though
this type of content works, it is very hard to deliver as it takes a lot of time to do (Walker,
2020).
Overall, guests with very low followers provide a good amount of content which
delivers a great number of likes and comments. These results show that the hotel does not
need to work with either photographs or influencers to share great content since their own
guests can do so.
5.2 Best Timing
The hotel is open yearly; its high season is usually from April to September when it
hosts several events and weddings. From October to March, it is usually a calmer season in
terms of visits, however, it is a very busy period for social media.
Indeed, as discussed with Cerqueira (2020), as there are fewer guests, there is a lack
of new content, therefore, it can be analyzed that those are the months with the lowest
percentage of publications. It can be seen that February has the lowest % with only 6,3 of
posts generated while September, shows a very high % with 11,1 of publications. The author
noted, however, that that specific month showed a lack of consistency. If some days were
skipped in terms of publications, some days had up to 3 posts published. This can explain the
fact that many photos were shared at that time, but also, the fact that it is at that period, that
SSDV had the lowest mean of likes and comments.
September appears to be a rollercoaster of a month as it shared loads of content that

generated poor results. On the contrary, with less content published in March and April, those
two months have the highest mean of likes and comments. The author’s interpretation is that
47
April is the start of the high season, the weather gets warmer and people are excited about
their upcoming travels which they show by generating the highest mean of likes with 618,17.
When it comes to the best days to post, the weekend seems to be both the best and
the worst moment to post. Saturday appears to be the day with the lowest % of posts;
however, it does show good results in terms of likes since it has the second-highest mean.
The percentages are well spread which makes sense since SSDV posts every day.
However, the low % of content can be explained by the fact that it is the weekend, and the
post was not planned to be published. Then, to catch up, two posts are posted on Sunday as
it was observed by the author during her analysis.
If the weekend appears to be inconsistent, the beginning of the week is very successful
with the highest mean of both likes and comments on Monday. Overall, the results are pretty
well spread which leads to believe that posts can work every day.
5.3 Best Photo Type
As it was mentioned in the chapter above, 18 topics have been identified to represent
each one of the 414 photos analyzed. If some of the themes seemed obvious to analyze and
were confirmed by the three other results that the author gathered from her colleagues, some
were not so clear.
Indeed, only one theme has been analyzed per photo even though it was clear that
some publications represented more than one aspect. Also, it came to the attention of the
researcher, that some other topics could have been identified such as vineyards.
Overall, the results of the topics are pretty clear to interpret. Everything related to the
landscape surrounding the hotel, as well the pool on the outside and the one inside at the
Spa, are all very successful as they either show the highest % in terms of presence in the feed
or the highest mean of likes and comments.
Even with the topics simplified and grouped into 8 categories, pool and landscape
photos show the highest results, while F&B, which had pretty low results separated in
different topics and not grouped, has the highest % of presence.
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When it comes to the lowest % of photos posted on the SSDV account, animals show
the lowest results in both the normal and simplified histogram. However, they have great
results in terms of likes and comments as it is a theme that pleases the guests.
On the opposite, activities show an extremely low mean of both likes and comments
compared to the % of presence on the Instagram’s feed. The author noted that most of the
photos used to show the hotel’s activities were photographers’ photos. And, as it was
identified earlier, that type of content producer is not so well perceived by followers as maybe
it is too professional looking and does not show authenticity.
When compared with the supposed best image content performance presented in
figure 9, it can be seen that themes such as plant and landscape are very popular, and it is
proven with landscape being very successful for SSDV. As for the rest, architecture, interiors,
pets, food, and drinking are all average which can also be identified in the tables analyzed. In
the same figure, there is no information regarding other themes gathered by the author such
as pool or anything related to activities to compare with.
To finish off the interpretation of the best photo type to be shared on SSDV’s account,
it is very clear that photos without anyone are more successful and less present. This goes
with what was discussed earlier which mentioned that touristic photos tend to not feature
people as it is most often taken to represent an activity or hotel. It is also the choice of the
Marketing team to not feature a lot of UGC with people featuring in them.
5.4 Best Post Caption
Even though a photo captures the attention of the audience, the text truly allows them
to connect with the content. Four types of description were identified: inviting, which gives
followers a sensation of “wanting” to do something or to go visit SSDV, question, which makes
the follower question himself and answer, story, which truly captivates and gets the follower
inspired, and tag, which is an invitation for followers to tag their friends and have them
interact with the post.
It seems obvious that the tag captions are the most successful in terms of likes and
comments. Indeed, they are a real invitation for actions. Whether it is tagging friends and
having them also liking the photo or simply tag them, it works, but by small quantities. Indeed,
49
as Dal Busco mentioned in his analysis (table 4), there is a feeling of obligation with these
types of description and not everyone likes it.
The Marketing team seems to be aware since there is only 4,1% of posts with a tag
captions which appears to be the lowest %, and still delivers great results. As for the lowest
mean of likes and comments, it is more inviting captions, which have the highest percentage
of presence, that appear to captive the least the followers. It can be explained by the fact that
60,1% of the captions are inviting, and therefore, maybe a little repetitive.
5.5 Best Number of Hashtags
Hashtags are always considered as very important for a brand to reach a higher
audience and get new followers. It was discussed in figure 10 that using more than 10 hashtags
was best when promoting. However, the results show that hashtags for SSDV are not so
important.
Indeed, it can be observed that there is a higher percentage of posts with 0 hashtags.
The author noticed that the account stopped using them from June to November. Therefore,
many publications did not feature any hashtags, not even their brand tags
(#SixSensesDouroValley). Even though it does not represent the highest mean of likes or
comments, it is pretty average.
The difference in means is not so big. Even though posts with more than 30 hashtags
appear to be more successful, it is questionable whether or not there is a link between these
two variables. The results are somewhat stable and do not show significant differences. Even
though there is a big variation in %, it looks like it does not affect the success of the
publications.
5.6 Insights Actions Taken
When it comes to truly determine the impact of the posts published by SSDV’, the
Instagram tool “insights” gives a good idea of how the photos are working. Only the top 10
photos in terms of likes were analyzed into details to see whether they show an impact in
terms of reservation or simple interactions.
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It can be seen that there are some actions taken which show an interest in booking.
Indeed, it can be observed that; get directions, website clicks, emails, and calls are interactions
that followers do when seeing a new post. However, they are rare even in the top 10 photos.
More actions towards the profile are noticeable like for example, sharing posts, saving
them, visiting the profile, or following the account. Actually, profile visits seems to be the most
taken actions in each of the photos which demonstrate an interest in knowing more about the
account.
Nonetheless, even though there are not more “booking” actions, the ones mentioned
above are still important and interesting as it is the best form of spreading information, a sort
of eWOM like it was discussed in the theoretical background. Indeed, electronic word-of-
mouth is a crucial marketing method as it comes directly from guests expressing their interest
or sharing their experience with others.
Also, despite the chosen posts being the most liked ones and therefore, most likely the
ones with the most interactions, it shows a big variety of actions taken. For example, it can be
observed in table 27 that post 5 generated more profile visits than post 3. Or post 6 had more
shares than post 2. Indeed, these results show that the interactions do not depend on the
number of likes but more on the preferences of the audience.
These actions demonstrate that there truly are actions taken with SSDV posts, whether
they show signs of wanting to book or are simply about engaging with the account, they are
important for the growth of the audience, but also, the credibility of the hotel. In other words,
there is an impact with the campaigns shared.
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Chapter 6. Recommendations
This final chapter indicates some recommendations from the author regarding the
results analyzed and interpreted earlier. These are taking into consideration the marketing
strategy of SSDV that is already discussed in chapter 2.
The author’s analysis and interpretation allow her to share recommendations to

improve some of the obtained results that can still be ameliorated. Then, those
recommendations and actual results are discussed with the marketing expert from Six Senses
Douro Valley; Isabel Cerqueira, Marketing Communications Coordinator. Through an
Interview, some questions are asked to have a better understanding of whether the team is
aware of some of the low results encountered with different factors, and whether Cerqueira’s
can be held responsible for the positive impact of SSDV’s campaigns. Finally, the limitations of
this thesis are mentioned to conclude all the work that has been done.
Some factors analyzed before such as the number of followers, people featured in the
photos, and the descriptions were not mentioned in the following section as they are
considered as successful by the author and were also already confirmed as part of SSDV
strategy in chapter 2. Those factors do not need further discussion as they appear to have the
expected positive impact in terms of campaigns.
6.1 Author’s Recommendations
While interpreting the results, some recommendations appeared very clearly to the
researcher. Indeed, some of the factors analyzed showed a need for improvement to be more
efficient, even though, SSDV’s strategy already seems to be working well.
To start, the content producer factor showed very different results from what was
expected and mentioned in the theoretical background. However, the strategy of the
marketing team already led to believe that Influencers were not the key producers of the
account as they do not reach out to them and invite them to the hotel. They simply do
collaborations when asked, with accounts that show similarities with the hotel’s philosophy.
Despite that, it was noted that Macro-Influencers had great results in terms of
engagement even though their presence on the account was very little. Therefore, a
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recommendation could be to only accept proposals from those Influencers rather than all the
levels which, regrouped, create low engagement.
Also, their own content delivers really poor results and it does not seem as the
marketing team is aware. For this reason, there is a real need for discussion and brainstorming
about how that type of content can be improved and be more appealing to their audience. An
idea could be to only have professional-looking photos from photographers and therefore,
regroup “own content” and “photographers” content. It could either be a designated
professional photographer or a new employee that would only be focusing on that part.
Therefore, there would be more content created and no problems with regards to a lack of
time and posting repetitive photos.
When it comes to months and days, the percentage of content published should be
almost identical as they post daily, but it is not, especially with the months. It is important to
be consistent especially as there is no particular month or day that stands out as being more
successful as the other. The results are pretty much in coherence with what has been
identified earlier in the interpretation. The best recommendation is to use a platform where
the posts can be prepared in advance and published daily without any skip.
The most complex results of this research are the ones about the topics. Indeed, they
were difficult to properly identify, even though they were supported by other opinions, and
sometimes confusing. Still, the results are interesting to analyze; if it was not as clear with the
18 topics exposed, once regrouped, it was easy to notice what works and what does not. What
is interesting with SSDV is the variety of topics and styles of photos that are shared, and
although some topics do not arouse interest from the audience, the account can not only post
photos of the landscape and the pool.
On the contrary, it is important to share everything that the hotel has to offer and that
is a very good strategy from the marketing team, however, there is a need for a creative and
new ideas on how to share content related to their activities and F&B. This recommendation
can be developed among their marketing team to come up with ideas.
To finish off, the results from the hashtags were also very different from what was
discussed in the theoretical background. Those were challenging to interpret as it leads to
believe that hashtags are not necessary for the success of a post, but then it seemed as they
53
are indeed important. Rather than always using different numbers of hashtags, the team could
have a list of 30 hashtags, which appeared to be the number to generate the most likes, and
always use those to reach a wider audience.
6.2 Discussion with Marketing Expert
During the interview led by the researcher with Isabel Cerqueira (see appendix VII), the
following topics were discussed: content producer, posting period, the theme of the photos
and hashtags. Those have all been identified by the author as subjects that need to be
furtherly analyzed and reviewed into details.
It started with an understanding of how SSDV selects its influencers and whether they
are interested in selecting them according to their level of followers or their style. As it was
mentioned in chapter 1, the marketing team does not search for influencers as they get daily
requests from them, however, Cerqueira decides which one matches best the current market
that the hotel is trying to reach, and which one shares their values.
When asked about whether the number of followers mattered, as it appeared that the
influencer’s philosophy was more important, Cerqueira agreed that it is also a very important
factor that needs to be acknowledged. Indeed, the influencers’ reaches, impressions and
overall engagement with their audience, is very important as the marketing team needs to
ensure that the personality will be able to reach the audience they are looking for.
But it is not all for the expert; she believes their strategy does not need to be better
defined and focus on only one type of influencers, she highlights the fact that their guests are
all very different. As the hotel has a wide variety of activities to offer and very strong values,
it attracts, as she listed, clients that like sustainability, others that like gastronomic food, some
that are interested in wine, and so on. Therefore, she states that the best strategy is to keep
welcoming different levels of influencers who can speak to different types of clients.
When discussing their own content and how it appeared to deliver the lowest results,
Cerqueira’s agreed that it is not the best strategy. She confirmed that the team uses more
UGC as it truly shows great results and creates more trust. However, for her, it is crucial to
also create their own content for a very specific reason. As she explained, when there is any
new menu or activity, they need to be the ones announcing it and therefore, use their own
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content. Since it does not happen very often, the expert manages to plan her time well to do
the necessary photos to post without requiring the help of a professional photographer.
The following topic was in regard to their posting time and whether there was a
difference in posting in the low and the high season. Cerqueira confirmed the author’s
interpretation by explaining that in Summer, the high season, she notices much more
engagement as it is when potential clients are searching for their next hotel to stay at. She
also claimed that throughout the year, the same type of posts is shared and there is a similar
level of results obtained.
Cerqueira continued and, again, accentuated the author’s interpretation by

highlighting the fact that in Summer, there is much more content to share, and sometimes, it
happened that several photos were shared in one day. Unlike in Winter when they have to
repeat some of their posts due to the lack of new content. However, she did agree that
posting up to 3 posts a day is too much information and confirmed that one post per day is
what they do now with the use of an app called Later where you can plan your posts in
advance. It is the perfect way to ensure that there is a stable percentage of posts published
every day, as it was recommended by the author above.
Then, the trickiest question and one of the most confusing factors that the author
analyzed, is what the marketing team can do to generate more interest in posts other than
the landscape of the hotel and the pool. The researcher herself did not find a solution to get
photos of activities and food to be more attractive and appealing to followers, and when
Cerqueira was asked the question, she mentioned that she and her colleague are aware of the
issue but have yet to find a solution. However, she stated that it is important to continue
sharing that type of content to promote their activities and what guests can do while staying
at the hotel.
Something that Cerqueira really insisted on is the fact that they have a wide variety of
clients with different interests. Therefore, some might really enjoy their campaigns about food
and others their content about their sports activities. To the expert, it is important to
acknowledge all of their followers and truly share every aspect of Six Senses Douro Valley.
Last but not least, the interview ended with a question about the hashtags and how
the account stopped using them for a while. It is interesting to understand whether it was part
55
of the strategy or not and if it had any impact. Unfortunately, Cerqueira was not part of the
team at the time of that analysis, therefore, she could not explain the reason behind.
Nonetheless, she highlighted the fact that today, she makes sure to use the brand hashtags as
it is mandatory, but also diverse tags that are in relation to the campaign. The key, to the
expert, is to use hashtags that match the photo rather than always repeating the same ones.
The effectiveness of this tool is furtherly discussed with the expert as she believes it is really
good to reach a wider audience.
6.3 Limitations
As for the limitations of this research paper, it is impossible to not mention the current
situation related to the pandemic. Indeed, Six Senses Douro Valley had to close from mid-
March until the beginning of June. During that time, the marketing strategy had to change and
adapt to what was happening. A new hashtag was created #AtHomeWithSixSenses and posts
different from the usual, were published on the account as there was no new content
generated to be shared.
This also influenced the research and obliged the author to analyze posts from the
previous year rather than the most recent ones. Unfortunately, it did affect the discussion and
interpretation as the marketing team changed since then, therefore it was difficult to
understand properly the strategy used for the publications that were analyzed as the person
in charge was not reachable.
As for the actual writing of the thesis, there were some limitations with the sources
available online. Indeed, the author realized that not so many scientific papers talked about
the impact of Instagram campaigns for a brand or even mentioned successful factors. Some
that were analyzed by the researcher were difficult to go furtherly into details due to the lack
of supportive sources to truly highlight the ideas behind the thesis. However, with the use of
different terms and even different languages, the author believes she managed to gather
enough sources to support this research paper.
Another limitation encountered was the interview with the marketing team. It was
supposed to feature the current Marketing Communications Coordinator, Isabel Cerqueira,
but also Joana Van Zeller, the Marketing Communications Manager. However, she was not
available nor interested in participating as she is the expert in Public Relations, and everything
56
related to organizing press conferences, press visits, etc., and not so much expert in
Marketing. Therefore, her opinion would not be so relevant to the research focusing on
Instagram. The author believes it would have been more interesting to have the opinion of at
least another expert, but there was no one from the hotel nor the Six Senses Group available
for it as there were other more important matters related to the situation of the hotels due
to the pandemic.
Finally, even though some of the limitations did affect the research, the author
managed to find other approaches and still obtained the final results through different
analysis and her own interpretation that would help her to determine whether Six Senses
Douro Valley campaigns generated any impact.
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Conclusion
Through the analysis conducted, the main objective of this thesis which was to find an
approach that allows the researcher to understand the success factors of Six Senses Douro
Valley’ strategy in regards to their Instagram account to determine whether the campaigns
they publish have an impact on the hotel’s bookings or the interaction with their social media
page, was achieved.
Indeed, the objectives set were accomplished as an approach to measure the impact
of Instagram campaigns was created with a grid table executed on Excel, the author managed
to identify the key factors of success with the help of descriptive analysis and cross tables to
analyze and interpret the results, and finally, some recommendations were given to the
marketing team so they could have new tools to ameliorate the impact of their campaigns.
The main findings of the analysis showed that guests with very low followers deliver
the best content for SSDV. It also demonstrated stable results in terms of posting times
whether it is in months or days. As for the topics, it was obvious that campaigns related to the
hotel’s landscape or pool, without anyone on them, generated the highest interest. Captions
that engaged the audience with questions or tag have the most success, and finally, hashtags
do not appear to affect the success of the campaigns as they get success with both less than
1 tags and with 30 or more.
Some of the findings mentioned above are in harmony with the themes that were
discussed in the theoretical background. For example, as De Veirman et al. (2017) stated, a
message is perceived as more authentic when it comes from a consumer and it is the case
with SSDV since guests’ content shows the highest results. However, it showed the opposite
of what was stated as influencers are not their best promoting tool.
In the recommendations elaborated by the author, the first one suggested was that
they only choose macro-influencers as it was their most performant level of influencers.
However, according to Walker (2018), micro and mid-tier are the best types to reach the
highest engagement. But even with this recommendation and analysis, the marketing expert
prefers to continue with their strategy of choosing influencers who share their vision and are
relevant to the hotel, which was also explored in the theoretical background supported by
Ristova & Angelkova (2019).
58
Overall, this thesis showed that Six Senses Douro Valley has a good marketing strategy
even though some of their practices do not match the findings discussed in the theoretical
background. When those were questioned, the expert made it clear that they are not ready
to change their approach as it has shown very good results. And indeed, it has proven the
generate a great impact on the hotel’s platform.
The only unsuccessful factor that still needs some reflection is how to make activities
and food campaigns interesting. Indeed, this was the only point that Cerqueira agreed needed
improvement and will need further discussion to find a solution among their team. As it was
presented in figure 9 of the best image content performance on instagram, some of those
topics like food, sport activities and drinks all show a good engagement percentage, therefore,
there is room for improvement with a good rethinking of how to present those campaigns to
reach higher results and get more impact.
To conclude, it seems as SSDV truly knows what they are doing in terms of marketing.
There were not so many recommendations from the author as most of the factors analyzed
demonstrated good results, and those that did not and were explained to the expert, were
not of interest to Cerqueira. However, it is understandable, as what this thesis, through the
method created by the author to analyze their campaigns, showed is that their campaigns
have a great impact on both the booking and interactions with the hotel. For this reason, the
team can really be held accountable for their success and overall strategy, and the impact that
their campaigns have on their online presence and reputation.
59
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Author’s Declaration
I hereby declare that I have carried out this final research project on my own without
any help other than the references listed in the list of references and that I have only used the
sources mentioned. I will not provide a copy of this paper to a third party without the
permission of the department head and of my advisor, including the partner company with
which I collaborated on this project, with the exception of those who provided me with
information needed to write this paper and whose names follow : Roland Schegg, Isabel
Cerqueira, Christian Dal Busco, Aurélie Stampfli, Inès Salih and Alexis Auchlin.
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1

Keywords: Instagram, Marketing Strategy, Six Senses Group, Influencers, User-Generated-Content

By specializing in E-tourism, the researcher already had knowledge on campaigns,

LIST OF ABREVIATIONS VII

CHAPTER 1. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 3

1.1 Digitalized Marketing and Why it Became so Important 3

1.2 Instagram’s Rise to Success 8

1.3 Six Senses Douro Valley’s Vision 13

CHAPTER 2. RESEARCH QUESTION 18

2.1 SSDV Analysis 18

2.2 Objectives of the Research 21

3.1 Different Steps 22

3.2 Preparation of the Grid 23

3.3 Data Analysis Process 29

3.4 Others Analysis 30

CHAPTER 4. PRESENTATION OF RESULTS 34

4.1 Content Producer Results 34

4.2 Followers Results 36

4.3 Month Results 37

4.4 Day Results 38

4.5 Topic Results 39

4.6 People Results 41

4.7 Description Results 42

4.9 Insights Results 44

CHAPTER 5. ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION 46

5.1 Best Content Producer Profile 46

5.2 Best Timing 47

5.3 Best Photo Type 48

5.4 Best Post Caption 49

5.5 Best Number of Hashtags 50

5.6 Insights Actions Taken 50

6.1 Author’s Recommendations 52

6.2 Discussion with Marketing Expert 54

APPENDIX I: SCREENSHOT OF SSDV’S INSTAGRAM FOLLOWERS ON THE 8TH OF APRIL 2020 69

APPENDIX II: TOP 10 PHOTOS IN TERMS OF LIKES, POSTED ON SSDV ACCOUNT 70

APPENDIX III: FULL GRID OF ANALYSIS 75

APPENDIX IV: DESCRIPTIVE ANALYSIS AND CROSS TABLES 82

APPENDIX VI: GRID CREATED FOR THE INSIGHTS 93

APPENDIX VII: INTERVIEW WITH ISABEL CERQUEIRA 94

Table 1: Grid created on Excel by the author 24

Table 2: Grid created on Excel by the author, Top 10 Likes 29

Table 3: Grid created on Excel by the author for others analysis 31

Table 5: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Alexis Auchlin 32

Table 6: Grid created on Excel by the author, filled by Aurélie Stampfli 33

Table 7: Histogram created on Excel by the author 35

Table 8: Histogram created on Excel by the author 35

Table 9: Histogram created on Excel by the author 36

Table 10: Histogram created on Excel by the author 36

Table 11: Histogram created on Excel by the author 37

Table 12: Histogram created on Excel by the author 37

Table 13: Histogram created on Excel by the author 38

Table 14: Histogram created on Excel by the author 38

Table 15: Histogram created on Excel by the author 39

Table 16: Histogram created on Excel by the author 39

Table 17: Histogram created on Excel by the author 40

Table 18: Histogram created on Excel by the author 40

Table 19: Histogram created on Excel by the author 41

Table 20: Histogram created on Excel by the author 41

Table 21: Histogram created on Excel by the author 42

Table 22: Histogram created on Excel by the author 42

Table 23: Histogram created on Excel by the author 43

Table 24: Histogram created on Excel by the author 43

Table 25: Histogram created on Excel by the author 44