Nielsen: Celebrity Fans and Followers Are Valuable Online Assets

We all know that celebrity endorsement can lend valuable benefits to any brand both off- and online, and in a previous post,  I discussed how marketers are leveraging celebrities to add lift to their social media campaigns.

Now, new research from The Nielsen Company adds yet another twist to the story. The new data indicates that it’s not only the celebrities themselves that are valuable to marketing campaigns –their online fans and followers can be significant assets, as well.

More specifically, the Nielsen research shows that 64 percent of adult US internet users who follow a celebrity also follow a brand. That means the typical celebrity follower is a whopping four times more likely to follow a brand than the average US adult online.

In addition, Nielsen found that celebrity fans and followers are anything but shy online. For example:

• Celebrity fans are more likely to offer advice and opinion to fellow online consumers. Nielsen found that this was particularly true with regard to entertainment topics, where nearly one-third of celebrity fans (32 percent) online provide advice on movies –making them 44 percent more likely than the average online user to do so. More than one-quarter (28 percent) provide guidance on music (56 percent more likely) and television programs (34 percent more likely).

• In addition, celebrity fans were significantly much more likely than the average adult online to comment/post on social networking sites (86 percent more likely), view consumer generated video (83 percent more likely), visit a social networking site (67 percent more likely) and play online games (45 percent more likely).

• Plus, one-quarter also used the web to conduct personal banking transactions and manage their credit card accounts. Top online purchases among these online fans included clothing/shoes/accessories (18.2 percent), music (13.8 percent) and books (13.6 percent).

Based on these results, it’s clear that celebrity endorsers can have a dramatic impact online in multiple ways. Not only do celebrities add lift to social media messages, but their engaged fans and followers can amplify brand message quite considerably across the social media channel.

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