celebrities Tag

This past week in Austin I organized and spoke on a panel called “Influencer Throwdown: Defining and Debating Influence Once and For All” with some marketing friends. Here’s a good recap of the session and a few quotes:
The panel began with some discussion around celebrities and how they are perceived as influencers.  The big (obvious) example used was Charlie Sheen.  Does he have influence?  The panel was split on this, and they each had their opinions on it.  David Binkowski cited that 8% of Americans trust celebrities.  I would tend to agree with him.
And we spent a lot of time discussion this:

Those who know me know that I am not a fan of celebrity endorsements to drive brand campaigns. Yes, the celebrity gives you some fake impressions, but it doesn't actually benefit the brand. In fact, even with the multiple publicity circuit appearances on Entertainment Tonight, the red carpet and elsewhere, only 8% of consumers only trust celebrity endorsements.  Which brings me to the train wreck that is Charlie Sheen. I abstained from talking about this but a friend wrote such a wonderful post about it that I had to transfer the spotlight over to him.