When Content Matters Most: Digital Influencers and Tourist Destination Choices
Abstract
Digital influencers have become increasingly relevant in tourism communication, particularly in the dissemination of destination-related information and experiences through social media. This study examines the association between selected digital influencer attributes and respondents’ perceived influence of travel influencers. A quantitative survey of social media users who followed digital influencers was conducted, yielding 147 valid responses. The questionnaire measured perceptions of influencer-generated content, credibility, authenticity, influencer experience, interactivity, relationship-related characteristics, and other relevant attributes using seven-point Likert scales. An exploratory principal component analysis (PCA) with Oblimin rotation was conducted to identify the empirical structure of the observed dimensions, followed by binary logistic regression to examine their associations with respondents’ perceived influence by travel influencers. The PCA yielded eight empirical components accounting for 81.188% of the total variance. Among the dimensions included in the estimated regression model, content essence was the only predictor that reached conventional statistical significance (β = 0.556, p = 0.035; Exp(B) = 1.743). The remaining predictors did not reach statistical significance at the 5% level. The findings provide exploratory evidence that content-related characteristics may have particular statistical relevance for respondents’ perceived influence by travel influencers when several influencer-related components are considered simultaneously. However, the results should be interpreted as statistical associations rather than causal effects. The study contributes to the tourism influencer marketing literature by highlighting the relevance of content-related characteristics while emphasizing the need for further research using larger samples, validated measurement models, and clearly specified behavioral outcomes.