The $10,000 Influencer Mistake

"Not just any influencer. A social media personality with more than 300,000 followers, a polished online presence, her own photographer, and a reputation for being "highly influential" in our city. She reached out with a proposal business owners see every day: Free services in exchange for promotion. At the time, influencer marketing was exploding. Brands were chasing follower counts, and influencers were positioning themselves as the new media powerhouses. Traditional advertising was fading; Instagram was ascendant. So we agreed to work with her."

"The request that kept growing When she arrived at the med spa, the conversation quickly shifted from a single service to a running wish list. Could we enhance this? Improve that? Look at another area? Just put in a few more syringes? The list kept expanding. This happens more often than people realize-scope creep disguised as casual conversation. By the end of the appointment, she had received approximately $10,000 in services."

"From a compliance standpoint, everything was handled correctly. We had a detailed written agreement, clear posting requirements, instructions on what she could and couldn't claim, a timeline for deliverables, and even a noncompete preventing her from working with our competitors. She upheld her end. She posted. She tagged. She said all the right things. The result: Silence. We monitored the phones, direct messages, website traffic-every possible indicator that her posts were driving business. Nothing. Not one booked appointment."

A med spa engaged an influencer with more than 300,000 followers for free services in exchange for promotion. The influencer expanded the requested services during the appointment, creating scope creep and ultimately received about $10,000 in procedures. The partnership included a detailed written agreement with posting requirements, limits on claims, a timeline, and a noncompete. The influencer fulfilled posting obligations, but monitoring showed no increase in appointments or traffic. The lack of results reflected audience misalignment: many followers were not interested in medical aesthetics. The experience emphasizes vetting audience relevance, controlling scope, and measuring conversion potential for influencer partnerships.

Read at Inc