Charlie Sheen, Twitter and the Future of Brand Marketing
Posted: 03/08/2011 12:00:00 AM EST | 2
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If the world were like Inception, Charlie Sheen would be its Leonardo DiCaprio. His PR team has been on a roll and his face has managed to grace everything but the milk carton. But quite possibly the most fascinating development among his latest PR stunts is his newfound Twitter page.
For an individual who doesn’t appear too tech savvy, this has raised some eyebrows. Furthermore, he has vowed openly to use Twitter as a source of revenue. That’s right, America. Charlie Sheen is going to suck capitalism dry.
Sky News reports that, “Sheen said he planned to make $1m by the end of this year after signing with Ad.ly - a firm that sets up social networking endorsements for 150 brands.”
Brand Channel reports that Ad.ly “pairs brands and celebrity endorsers on social networks,” and “now sharing its metrics, Ad.ly's new Consumer Influence Index tracks the celebrities that drive the most consumer traffic to advertisers’ sites.”
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And he isn’t the only one. Kim Kardashian is reportedly charging up to $25,000 to endorse products and other celebrities and sports stars like Lindsay Lohan and New York Jets center Nick Mangold have also started tweet-profiting.
What does this mean for the product marketing business? Will this idea actually help sell products when the celebrities themselves appear to not be directly tied to the brand, such as those who might contract Sheen via Ad.ly? And is it ethical?
Michael Biondo, VP of Customer Operations for Thumbplay, is one of the most social media-savvy professionals I’ve come across as of late.
In regards to celebrity Twitter endorsements, Biondo says, “I'm a bit torn on this topic - I certainly believe that paid recommendations may not be genuine or authentic. I say may because it is also possible that the celebrity/influencer is a fan of the product and wants to help to get the word out and the income is just icing on the cake.”
As for whether or not the development is ethical from a marketing industry standpoint, Biondo added,
“The FTC is looking at including "paid endorsement" messaging to be included in this such chatter. This should help followers identify genuine vs. suspect mentions. I do believe recommendations from one’s social circle have much more of an impact. At the end of the day, Caveat emptor.”
Caveat emptor indeed.
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Gina Scanlon |
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While I think that the intention in social media was to allow people to read opinions of others, preferable ones they knew well, as one part of the decision making process when purchasing a product or service, I suspect that this process was subverted early on by people or companies creating reams of recommendations, tweets, and other social media activity simply to make it appear popular.
Supposedly this type of activity is transparent and quickly discerned by social media users and, thus, very ineffective. But as people come to social media as neophytes, they may not have the savvy to recognize these types of edge of ethics activities. Like anything else massive numbers of people join in using something after the lower numbers of early adopters have managed to make mainstream, it will take some time for them to become proficient in learning to recognize this type of behavior.
So, I do believe there is good reason at this point to create some sort of disclaimer. Whether the celebrity uses and likes the product or not, once the celebrity's persona is used to sell something and the celebrity is being paid for it, there is no way to tell the difference. Making a small box showing that the following tweet or other content is a paid endorsement should be a best practice to ward off feelings of ill-use from the public if the paid relationship becomes public.
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Replies (0)
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It's the latest in real time entertainment coming from social media. It's not too different then reality television, where we get to see lives falling apart, couples divorcing, winners and failures. From a branding perspective, the real question for me, how does this help us to be more conscious of brand values, brand promises, brand performance, brand perceptions? I liken it to a visit to the circus, where the entertainment is high wired, dangerous animal acts and the food served consist of junk food, like cotton candy, that has no nutritional value and leaves you with a stomach ache.
Just my opinion: Keith Fiveson, CEO - www.itesa | www.getcustomerexperience.com
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