Ykone

Ykone is an international influencer marketing agency working with the world’s top brands

Through the use of highly creative content, Ykone helps brands to create successful international campaigns that are not only visually appealing and impactful but also deliver tangible results. Ykone brings content creators, or “influencers”, and brands together in perfect pairings.

Due to the nature of the agency, internal team trips aren’t the only cause for business travel spend. The agency also facilitates the travel of influencers to video and photoshoot locations around the world.

"Before TravelPerk, our company was booking trips in a very old school way. We were booking flights and hotels on consumer websites, and it was a nightmare to keep track of everything."

Olivier Billon, CEO at Ykone

The difficulty of tracking project-based spend

“Before TravelPerk, our company was booking trips in a very old school way,” says Olivier Billon, CEO of Ykone. “We were booking flights and hotels on consumer websites, and it was a nightmare to keep track of everything.” Employees were constantly tasked with pulling up travel itineraries and answering questions for the influencers. Meanwhile, it was also a struggle to keep track of how much was being spent per month on travel for each client project and for the company as a whole.

“Many of our projects involve travel, and as we continue to work with more luxury brands, we need to ensure that our influencers have amazing travel experiences,” says Billon. The company had an urgent need to fix the way travel was managed. The pain of chasing invoices and itineraries was growing day by day. However, Ykone couldn’t sacrifice access to great travel options in order to solve administrative needs.

Upgrading travel management and tracking monthly spend

Billon discovered TravelPerk during a web search and felt inspired by the company’s values and mission to rewire business travel. The team switched over from consumer booking tools and never looked back. With the trip budget pre-approved, business travelers or account managers can book trips themselves in one unified place.

After the team began booking all new business travel through TravelPerk’s platform, Billon was quickly able to see the results. “With TravelPerk, it’s now much easier to track our travel budget,” says Billon. “I login whenever I want and immediately see what has been spent on travel for the month.”

With travel in one place, Ykone project managers can easily pull up itineraries for the influencers they are working with. The finance managers can quickly manage the monthly budget and ensure that spend is on track. With tags and filters, reviewing travel spend by project is also much, much smoother, and no longer requires complicated manual processes.

With TravelPerk, it’s now much easier to track our travel budget. I login whenever I want and immediately see what has been spent on travel for the month.

Olivier Billon, CEO at Ykone

Consolidating business travel into one invoice

There’s no more chasing invoices, and no need to login to multiple platforms. “We don’t want to manage invoices and tickets for every plane, hotel, and train,” says Billon. “Having one single invoice for all our travel has changed our life.”

All in all, Ykone has experienced a simple but profound shift, and that’s one of bringing all business travel in one place. When business travel is inside of one platform with consumer-grade prices and options, it’s a win-win.