Article · Creators
How do you contact a hotel for a collab?
Write to the property’s marketing or communications lead, not to the Instagram account. Lead with what you deliver rather than what you want, show two or three comparable videos, and propose off-season dates. Expect a low reply rate: this is volume work, not luck.
Finding the right person
A direct message on Instagram is the worst way in. It lands in an inbox run by an agency or an intern, among dozens of identical requests, and nobody there can say yes. Look for a named address instead.
The property’s website.
The contact page, the legal notice, sometimes a press area. Independent properties often publish the manager’s address.
LinkedIn.
Search the hotel name and filter on marketing, communications or management roles. You get a name, which is enough to reconstruct an address.
The address pattern.
Most properties follow one scheme. A generic address found on the site gives you the pattern to apply to the name found on LinkedIn.
Writing the message
One rule: talk about what you give, not what you want. Hoteliers mostly receive requests for free nights; what stops them is a proposal of work.
Subject line: concrete, not flattering.
“Three vertical videos for your account, in exchange for two nights” reads in a second. “Collaboration” or “partnership” says nothing.
Two or three links, not your whole profile.
Show videos comparable to what you are proposing. One place, one mood, one format. Follower count is not the point: you are selling files, not an audience.
A specified proposal.
How many videos, what length, what delivery deadline, which uses and for how long. Without those four lines the hotelier cannot say yes, even if they want to.
Off-season dates.
You are asking for a room that would have stayed empty. Proposing a week in August on the Riviera is asking a shopkeeper to give away their best sale.
What to know before you start
Outreach works, but look at it honestly. You write to dozens of properties, most never reply, and the positive answers sometimes arrive weeks later, often unrelated to how good the message was. Expect several hours of research for a handful of usable addresses, then as much again in follow-up. It is a job of its own, before the filming one.
The trap at the end
The real risk is not silence, it is an agreement made in direct messages. A “yes, happily” is not a contract. It does not say how many videos, for which uses, for how long, or what happens if the result does not fit. It costs you at delivery: the property runs the footage longer than expected, or rejects the work, and you have nothing to point to. Put the terms in writing before the stay, even in a simple recap email.
Answers
Frequently asked questions
Do you need a minimum follower count to reach out?
No. The property buys files and the right to publish them, not an audience. Two or three well-shot videos are worth more than a followed account with no work to show.
Should you write in English or the local language?
In the language of the property’s website. A French hotel replies more readily in French; a guest house in Italy or Greece will read English without trouble.
How long before following up?
A week, once, adding something rather than repeating yourself. A second follow-up almost never converts and damages your name.
Should you name a price in the first message?
If you charge, yes. Announcing it late wastes both sides’ time, and a hotelier who discovers a figure after three exchanges feels cornered.
Read next
- The guideWhat is travel UGC?The definition, what sets it apart from influence and production, and how a collab runs.
- VenuesUGC for a hotel, a villa or an AirbnbWhat you receive, what it costs, and what the contract sets out.
- VenuesFour ways to get videos for your hotelAgency, freelance, in-house or collab: what each one costs and what it delivers.
What if this step did not exist?
Séjournée is a French travel UGC platform. Properties publish what they are looking for, with their dates and deliverables: you apply to an offer already written down, instead of hunting for an address and hoping for a reply. The creator account is free, with no commission.
See how it works