Member Article

Celebrity Endorsements: ‘A-list’ marketing strategy from My1stYears

Celebrity endorsements are nothing new and can often prove to be a time consuming and expensive activity. This was not the case for the personalised baby gifts retailer, My1stYears.com.

“The idea for sending some of our range to celebrities’ babies was one which developed naturally as the company grew,” explains My1stYears.com director Daniel Price.

“Pregnant celebrities and their offspring are always in the media, so we thought that there was no harm in capitalising on their fame and they were receiving high quality personalised baby products free of charge.”

The first celebrity to receive some of their products was the former X-Factor judge Dannii Minogue.
The team sent her box set of personalised products saying ‘Mummy’s got the X-Factor’.

Daniel continues: “We were completely taken aback by the response we got from Dannii. She really liked the gift and thanked us massively on Twitter. This created a social media frenzy surrounding our website and we saw a huge spike in sales as a result.

“We had similar success with Sir Elton John. When we found out that he and his partner David Furnish would be appearing on Heart radio, we knew all we had to do was to get a gift set over to the studio before he went live on air and we’d be in with a chance of getting an endorsement.

“The products were presented to Sir Elton and David live on air. They really liked what we had given them with both of them saying that they ‘loved’ it.

The endorsement was videoed and we were able to use it on our website. Again this celebrity testimonial of our products resulted in a large increase in sales.

“When he was presented with the gifts, Sir Elton said: ’They are beautiful, Zachary is going to get a lot of use out of them.”

“When it comes to promoting a business or establishing a brand identity, a celebrity endorsement can often prove to be the Midas touch. As long as interest remains in that particular celebrity, a small amount of interest will be directed at your brand.”

Although there have been quite a few cases where products have been sent off and the team heard nothing back, they have never encountered a celebrity who has been hostile to them.

Daniel concludes: “At the end of the day, your endorsement efforts equate to potentially free publicity to the celebrity. My advice to anyone trying to get a celebrity endorsement would be to keep pushing your product out to celebrities – one day you may just strike gold!”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Daniel Price .