Blog | Adly - Celebrity Endorsements in Social Media

Celebrity Endorsements In 5 Simple Steps

By Arnie Gullov-Singh on Tuesday, March 1st, 2011

Arnie Gullov-Singh, CEO

As is often the case for companies with disruptive business models, we routinely get asked how celebrity endorsements work in social media and how Ad.ly works in particular.

First and foremost, Ad.ly makes it easy for brands to connect with consumers efficiently and at scale in social media via today’s top celebrities.

Why celebrities? It’s simple. With the rise of blogs and social media, people are the new publishers. And the people with the greatest scale (most fans & followers) are celebrities.

Ad.ly has a network of over 1,000 influential celebrities in social media. We match them with brands on a campaign-by-campaign basis to endorse products to their fans and followers.

We’ve developed our network through a combination of personal relationships and data mining to ensure that we work with celebrities who can consistently deliver efficient, scalable results for brands.

Celebrity Endorsements in 5 Simple Steps:

1. Matching: Matching celebrities with brands is similar to matching media with brands. We make the match based on the brand’s campaign objectives and target audience. For example, a new product launch targeting moms and an acquisition program targeting teens would each require a different group of celebrities. We typically match a brand with 10-50 celebrities from the network, so that the brand can easily test to see which celebrities and which messages connect best with their target audiences.

2. Creative: Building creative for celebrity endorsements is a challenge, as one has to balance the brand’s goals against the celebrities’ need to sound authentic. The good news is we do it for you. After running 24,000 endorsements, our in-house copywriting team has mastered the art of writing high performing creative.

3. Pricing: Our pricing model is also very simple. It’s a flat fee per endorsement message, per celebrity, which currently ranges from a few hundred dollars to the low five figures (per celebrity). It is based on factors including the size of the celebrity’s fan base, the amount of engagement between the celebrity and their fans, and the prior performance of the celebrity’s endorsements.

4. Execution: Executing a traditional endorsement program typically involves additional distribution costs for media and creative above and beyond the fees to the celebrity. With Ad.ly, brands get everything in a single package for one price and we handle the entire execution from start to finish. We make it simple.

5. Measurement: Measuring a traditional endorsement program typically involves a brand spending well into the seven figures before knowing whether its working or not. With Ad.ly, brands can get started for as little as $50,000 and see within a day or two which celebrities and messages are delivering the best results.

We also offer the peace of mind that comes with working with the market leader. After running 24,000 endorsements for 150 brands — including Sony, Microsoft, AT&T, Toyota, NBC, Best Buy and more — we’ve developed an expertise in helping brands advertise efficiently and at scale in social media via today’s top celebrities.

Thanks for reading,

- Arnie

Disclosure is Simple, Clear and Conspicuous

By admin on Tuesday, January 18th, 2011

You may have seen a number of headlines last week — primarily coming out of the UK — about advertisers going straight to celebrities to do paid endorsements in Twitter *without* clear disclosure.

Just a quick reminder that – as always – 100% of Ad.ly endorsements are fully disclosed in accordance with guidelines from the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

When we launched in 2009, we established 100% disclosure as a best practice using #Ad, (Ad), or #Spon at the end of each endorsement, or a clear contextual statement such as “I am working with brand XYZ to promote product ABC.”

See some examples below, and check out CNN’s Richard Quest’s interview with Ad.ly founder Sean Rad re: proper disclosure for celebrities being paid to promote products on Twitter, Facebook and more. http://bit.ly/h4PCrS (VIDEO).

Let us know if you have any questions via our Twitter account @AdlyAds.

Can’t wait to see @DearJohnMovie! Available 5/25! Get your copy here: http://bit.ly/drAf7P & be sure to RT #DearJohn (Ad)less than a minute ago via Ad.ly NetworkLauren Conrad
LaurenConrad

Cute @iloverbb Paparazzi shot of ur new line! http://twitpic.com/2k1rsk Luv it, Rebecca Bonbon, U adorable puppy! http://bit.ly/aub2hl (Ad)less than a minute ago via Ad.ly NetworkKim Kardashian
KimKardashian

Introducing the Adly Consumer Influence Index

By admin on Tuesday, January 11th, 2011

P R E S S R E L E A S E

ADLY DEBUTS CONSUMER INFLUENCE INDEX; NAMES LAUREN CONRAD THE MOST INFLUENTIAL CELEBRITY ONLINE

Top 10 List Reveals Which Celebrities Drive the Most Consumer Traffic to Brand Advertisers’ Sites

Beverly Hills, CA – January 11, 2011 – Adly, which runs celebrity endorsements in social media, today announced the debut of its Consumer Influence Index.

The index – a top 10 list revealing which celebrities drive the most consumer traffic to advertisers’ sites – ranks Lauren Conrad as the most influential celebrity online for Q4, 2010 – followed by Kim Kardashian, Khloe Kardashian, and then rapper Snoop Dogg.

“If people are the new publishers, then people are also the future of advertising, and celebrities are the new ‘prime time’,” said Arnie Gullov-Singh, CEO, Adly, Inc. “That’s why we define influence as the ability to get people to visit places on the Web. This simple metric is essential to social media marketing. It’s how brands will decide where to spend their money.”

During the Q4 holiday shopping season, top Adly celebrities distinguished themselves as tastemakers in entertainment, fashion, consumer electronics and more. The following celebrities drove the most consumer traffic to advertisers’ campaign landing pages, Q4 holiday promotions and more:

1.) Lauren Conrad – 9.4 times Adly’s celebrity average
2.) Kim Kardashian – 8.7 times Adly’s celebrity average
3.) Khloe Kardashian – 8.5 times Adly’s celebrity average
4.) Snoop Dogg – 8.2 times Adly’s celebrity average
5.) Kourtney Kardashian – 7.9 times Adly’s celebrity average
6.) Paul Pierce – 7.9 times Adly’s celebrity average
7.) Michael Ian Black – 7.4 times Adly’s celebrity average
8.) Jenny McCarthy – 7.3 times Adly’s celebrity average
9.) Lamar Odom – 7.0 times Adly’s celebrity average
10.) Mark Cuban – 7.0 times Adly’s celebrity average

About the Adly Consumer Influence Index
The Adly Consumer Influence Index ranks celebrities in the Adly Influencer Network by a variety of factors to identify the most effective endorsers over a given period of time, in a particular vertical market, or in a specific demographic, etc. It uses Adly’s proprietary internal ranking system to normalize performance data and establish ‘celebrity averages’ for a variety of engagement and performance indicators.

About Adly
Adly runs celebrity endorsements in social media. We help brands connect with consumers via today’s most influential celebrities, athletes and artists on Facebook, Twitter and more. Adly is pioneering the celebrity endorsement market in digital media, tapping the $50 billion global spend on endorsements as well as the $35 billion global spend in digital advertising. In just 15 months, we have run 20,000 endorsements for 150 top brands. Based in Beverly Hills, we have raised over $6 million in venture capital from GRP Partners, Greycroft Partners and prominent angel investors.

Doing Social at Scale: Ad.ly in 2011

By admin on Wednesday, January 5th, 2011

We’re happy to report that 2010 ended with a bang!

The more success advertisers achieve in social media, the more budget they are happy to commit — and the Q4 holiday season bore this out.

Many thanks to everyone who helped make it happen.

Going forward: As we enter 2011, we are singularly focused on helping brand advertisers connect with consumers through celebrity endorsements in social media.

We have therefore updated our fan / follower minimum to 25,000 for Twitter and MySpace accounts.

Here’s why: Advertisers pick the Ad.ly Influencers they want to work with based on a number of factors: personal brand, fan / follower reach and more.

And for the most part, they select celebrities, athletes and artists that have the ability to inspire engagement with millions of passionate fans and followers.

(See Khloe Kardashian endorsing Old Navy or Lamar Odom endorsing Jay-Z’s book release treasure hunt on Bing.)

What this means: If you are an Ad.ly Influencer with fewer than 25,000 fans / followers, we have taken you out of market until such time as you reach the new minimum on at least one network.

We understand that the new count may be out of reach for you — at least in the near term — and we apologize for the disappointment that may cause.

We hope you will agree that it is better to have a clear understanding of how advertisers’ needs have evolved, as well as realistic expectations for how that impacts your earning potential with Ad.ly.

Please email us at Help@Ad.ly with any questions.

Want to know how Old Navy makes your butt look scary good? Ask a Kardashian http://bit.ly/cU2GLX (Ad)less than a minute ago via Ad.ly NetworkKhloe Kardashian
KhloeKardashian

My man Jay-Z…only rapper to rewrite history without a pen. Until now. Check out Jay’s new book Decoded on Bing. http://jol.ly/0AMS
#adless than a minute ago via Ad.ly NetworkLAMAR ODOM
RealLamarOdom

Happy Holidays from Everyone at Adly!

By admin on Thursday, December 23rd, 2010

First of all, we’d like to wish all of you a very happy, relaxing and safe holiday break.

We wish you all of the joy and warmth of friends and family at this special time of year, and look forward to working with you on some killer creative campaigns in 2011.

When you want to absolutely crush it on Twitter… you know who to call.

Second of all, if one of your goals for 2011 is to beef up your social media presence, you will want to check this out.

Neal Schaffer of Windmills Marketing has compiled SocialMediaToday’s “best of 2010″ posts with Twitter tips for beginners as well as intermediate and/or expert users. See the full collection here.

Don’t forget that Adly can help you achieve meaningful scale in Social Media, and tap the passion of celebrities’ fans. See the blog post below from our own @Arnie Gullov-Singh, CEO of @Adly.

Thanks and happy holidays to all!
-The Adly Team

Doubling Down on Celebrity Endorsements

By admin on Monday, November 15th, 2010

You may have noticed a few changes to our site. As we grow into our 2nd year, we are doubling down on our initial strategy — connecting brands to consumers via the top influencers in social media.

In fact, we are fine-tuning our focus on scalable, easy-to-execute endorsements from celebrities, artists, athletes and experts who are highly engaged with their audiences on Twitter, etc.

We believe that they are a driving force in social media, creating the lion’s share of the content that attracts consumers in the first place and keeps them coming back.

That’s why this week we are reaching out to a number of developers to let them know that we are winding down our API.

As a start-up, we must focus our energy and resources on our core business – where we are seeing the greatest growth and opportunity.

What this means:

We will continue to serve ads to the apps that use our API for the next 30 days — until Wednesday, Dec. 15, 2010. Thereafter, our API will be turned-off, and no more ads will be served to those apps. We will issue developers their final payment for ads displayed (via check or PayPal) on Friday, Dec. 31, 2010.

We have stopped accepting new ad buys for the API, as we have enough ads to fulfill the inventory allotted us over the next 30 days. Longer-term buyers are being migrated over to our Celebrity Network.

As we are communicating one-on-one this week with developers, we regret any disruption or disappointment this may cause, and we genuinely appreciate the time and effort that folks put into working with our API.

Ad.ly Hops the Channel

By admin on Monday, November 1st, 2010

This past week we made quite a splash in the UK and Australia, where advertisers and celebrities alike are eager to join Ad.ly and help us bring the business abroad.

It all started with the Sunday Times of London doing a feature story on the concept of celebrity tweets. The story, “Tweet Talking Stars Cash In” is behind a firewall, but you can read the follow-on stories it inspired below.

The momentum built from there to include a recorded interview for BBC Radio as well as stories in the The Sun, TNT Magazine, News.com.au, The Sydney Morning Herald and more.

We also had a great interview with the The Mail Online, Sunday Edition, so we will add that link here once the story appears.

We are focused on building out our business in the US right now, but we have done a few campaigns in the UK — most notably for KIA (the auto manufacturer).

We look forward to working with the always creative and often edgy UK Advertising creatives soon.

Is LA the New Venture Capital?

By admin on Monday, October 18th, 2010

Today, we are pleased to be featured as one of the hottest start-ups in Los Angeles in a piece by Reuters News. Reporter (and author) Sue Zeidler took a look at VC investing in the LA market in a piece called Venture Capitalists Set Sights on Hollywood.

Inspired in part by the AlwaysOn OnHollywood event — which asked the question “Is LA the New Venture Capital?” — Sue also interviewed Mark Suster of GRP Partners, an Ad.ly board member and one of our VC investors.

This came after last week’s pleasant surprise — a call from AllThingsD where Peter Kafka had heard about our upcoming Ad.ly Celebrity Bundle idea. More to come on that soon, but you can get a little teaser and get a sneak peek at what we have in the works in his article here.

We were similarly thrilled with the chance to chat with Ryan Corazza, who covers social media and sports for ESPN. You can get his take on his talk with Ad.ly founder Sean Rad in his ESPN Jock-O-Sphere column.

Finally, Ad.ly CEO Arnie Gullov-Singh had the pleasure of meeting Ben Popper of the New York Observer‘s Media Mob column, where he shared a bit about our plans to take Manhattan.

TV Shows are Getting Social Buzz from Ad.ly

By admin on Tuesday, October 12th, 2010

Real time data is one of the hottest new areas in the online ad business – brands and marketers want to know how to harness real-time information and interactions with consumers to make decisions on the fly.

We met with pal Daisy Whitney to talk about how we at Ad.ly are achieving results by pairing TV shows like NBC Community with online celebs to generate engagement, buzz and improved ratings.

Check out Daisy’s take in her New Media Minute video above, and don’t forget to visit DaisyWhitney.com.

Ad.ly Goes to OnHollywood: The Entertainment Venture Summit

By admin on Tuesday, September 28th, 2010

Our CEO Arnie Gullov-Singh will be speaking on a panel at the 5th Annual OnHollywood Entertainment Venture summit — tomorrow Sept. 29 at 3:30 p.m.

If you plan to attend, be sure to stop by and say hi.

LA: The New Capitol of Venture Capital?
From the hills of Caltech to the shores of Santa Monica, LA is buzzing with digital media and entertainment, mobile, social media, video game, software, and consumer internet entrepreneurs. And, more venture capital than ever is chasing these deals. Why has LA become so hot, and what’s the outlook for the next three to five years?

Moderator: Jim Jonassen, CEO, Jim Jonassen & Associates
William Woodward, Partner, Anthem Venture Partners
Paul Bricault, Executive Vice President, William Morris Consulting, William Morris Talent Agency; Adjunct Faculty, USC School of Cinematic Arts
John Gentry, CEO, Spot Runner
Arnie Gullov-Singh, CEO, Ad.ly

Here is the full agenda. Hope to see you there!

Adly Blog