Submitted by YKONEAgency IPI Score 84/100

Memories of Abu Dhabi

Influencer Marketing

YKONE embedded 33 creators in Abu Dhabi's heritage sites and a Michelin-starred dinner to launch MEMO Paris's place-inspired fragrance, reporting 207.2M impressions and 10.8M reach.

10.8Mreach
207.2Mimpressions
1.3Minteractions

About the campaign

MEMO Paris, the travel-themed fragrance house, needed to introduce its Abu Dhabi edition, built around regional ingredients including dates, saffron, cardamom, vetiver, prunes, and amber, to audiences in and beyond the Middle East without leaning on generic product posts. The risk for a niche fragrance invoking a place is that the connection feels nominal, so YKONE's 2025 campaign was designed to make it experiential: creators would encounter the locations and ingredients behind the scent first-hand rather than receiving a bottle in a studio setting.

The activation ran in two parts, a launch dinner at Michelin-starred Erth Restaurant in Abu Dhabi bringing together VIPs, influencers, and press around a fragrance-inspired menu and interactive activities, followed by the immersive Memo Days creator trip through Abu Dhabi Heritage Village, Mazaraa Farm, and the Abu Dhabi Art Fair. YKONE handled casting, artistic direction, event production, and content production, drawing on its offices in Abu Dhabi and Dubai, with a roster including @sananas2106, @krystal_bick, @natekatsuki, and @azramian whose audiences span Europe, North America, and the Gulf.

Thirty-three creator accounts produced more than 1,100 Instagram posts, and YKONE reports 10.8 million reach, 207.2 million impressions, and 1.3 million interactions at a 12.1 percent engagement rate, all agency-reported figures.

Case in 60 seconds

MEMO Paris needed to introduce its Abu Dhabi fragrance edition — built around regional ingredients including dates, saffron, cardamom, vetiver, prunes, and amber — to audiences in and beyond the Middle East without relying on generic product posts.

A place-inspired fragrance gains credibility when creators encounter the locations and ingredients behind it first-hand, rather than receiving the product in a studio setting, as YKONE's campaign framing reflects.

Translate the fragrance's identity into Abu Dhabi's emblematic scenery by taking a curated roster of fashion and lifestyle creators through the city's heritage sites, farms, and cultural institutions, anchored by an intimate VIP and press dinner, as described in YKONE's portfolio.

The campaign ran in two parts: a launch dinner at Michelin-starred Erth Restaurant with VIPs, influencers, and press, followed by the "Memo Days" immersive creator trip through Abu Dhabi's Heritage Village, Mazaraa Farm, and the Abu Dhabi Art Fair. Thirty-three creator accounts produced over 1,100 posts across Instagram.

YKONE reports the campaign reached 10.8M people, generated 207.2M impressions, and 1.3M interactions. All figures are agency-reported and have not been independently verified.

Strategy Breakdown

The primary strategy-learning section — interpretation, not a press-release summary.

The campaign targeted luxury fragrance consumers and fashion and lifestyle audiences in and beyond the Middle East, with particular attention to followers of internationally recognised creators such as @sananas2106, @krystal_bick, and @natekatsuki, whose audiences span Europe and North America as well as the Gulf region.
Niche fragrance launches in the Gulf risk feeling imported and disconnected from the regional culture they claim to draw on. A campaign built around the city's heritage sites, traditional farms, and art institutions offered a way to ground the product in the place itself rather than simply invoking it in copy.
The niche fragrance category relies on storytelling about provenance and ingredient origin. Translating that story into creator content that feels authentic rather than scripted requires creative conditions that standard gifting or studio briefs rarely produce.
MEMO Paris positioned itself as a travel-themed fragrance house, and the Abu Dhabi edition sits within that existing brand frame. The campaign's role was to make the Abu Dhabi connection tangible and experiential rather than nominal.
Creators who visit and experience a place produce richer, more varied content than those briefed remotely, and that variety across a large roster supports both press coverage and sustained social volume, as YKONE's two-part structure was designed to deliver.

Creative & Execution System

Assets & channels

  • Instagram creator posts (primary distribution channel)
  • Creator trip photography and video content
  • Launch dinner event content
  • Press and VIP dinner at Michelin-starred Erth Restaurant, Abu Dhabi

Partners

  • YKONE (lead agency, influencer casting and booking, artistic direction, creative guidelines, event production, content production — source)
  • Erth Restaurant, Abu Dhabi (Michelin-starred dinner venue — source)
  • Abu Dhabi Heritage Village (trip destination — source)
  • Mazaraa Farm (trip dining destination — source)
  • Abu Dhabi Art Fair (trip cultural destination — source)

Participation mechanic

  • VIP and press attendance at Erth Restaurant launch dinner with fragrance-inspired dishes and interactive activities
  • Immersive Memo Days creator trip through Abu Dhabi heritage and cultural sites
  • Creator content production and posting across 33 Instagram accounts

Creator role

  • Lead content creators producing organic posts across Instagram (@azramian, @sananas2106, @krystal_bick, @natekatsuki, and others — source)
  • Trip documenter: @nidogemedia, credited with documenting the Memo Days trip (source)

Results & Evidence

MetricValueResult type
Total reach10.8M peopleReach
Total impressions207.2MImpressions
Total interactions1.3MEngagement (interactions)

Why YKONE's strategy worked

  1. 1

    A two-part structure — an intimate press dinner followed by an experiential creator trip — generates two distinct content moments from one campaign window: controlled press coverage and a high volume of organic creator posts. YKONE's portfolio credits this structure as central to the campaign's content output.

  2. 2

    For a place-inspired product, placing creators inside the place itself — heritage villages, traditional farms, art institutions — gives them direct access to the sensory and cultural references behind the product, which can produce content that is harder to script in a studio setting, as the Memo Days trip design suggests.

  3. 3

    Pairing fashion and lifestyle creators with a dedicated trip documenter (@nidogemedia) supports a consistent visual record of the activation separate from individual creator posts, which the agency credits as part of the casting approach.

  4. 4

    An agency's existing regional infrastructure — YKONE's Abu Dhabi and Dubai offices, established over a decade — can reduce production friction for on-ground event delivery in markets where local logistics are complex, as noted in the YKONE Caviar Club press release.

  5. 5

    A reported engagement rate across a 33-creator roster and 1,100+ posts, if accurate, suggests that experiential briefing conditions — where creators experience the product's source material — may support higher content quality and audience response than remote briefings, though the engagement rate calculation methodology is not disclosed.

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