Lori Loughlin

[Ginger]

No, I thought Kourtney proves your point. Her parents didn't think she was too good for ASU and needed to pull strings to get her into a supposedly better school. People still refer to Kourtney as the "smart" one just because she went to college, despite it being known as a party school.

[kateln]

Mar 19, 2019 9:34:54 GMT -4 Ginger said:

No, I thought Kourtney proves your point. Her parents didn't think she was too good for ASU and needed to pull strings to get her into a supposedly better school. People still refer to Kourtney as the "smart" one just because she went to college, despite it being known as a party school.

Yeah, it was known as a party school in the 90's--but now, it's actually a pretty well respected University--hell, they paired up with Starbucks and their baristas can get an education there online. I don't think it would have been a bad idea to send any kid there.

[Deleted]

Ah, apologies Ginger! I misinterpreted your post. I was also thinking of the Jenners and I always get them and the Kardashians mixed up. Kourtney seems like the one who has her shit together the most (relatively speaking).

[petitesuite]

Mar 19, 2019 8:09:53 GMT -4 @ximena said:

But there is such a thing as a "Stay On My Internets" blogger/influencer, and what separates the good from the bad is creativity and originality. So I'm okay with the example of the sixteen year old kid with the crafting, or Tavi Gevinson's Style Rookie, or certain people on Instagram, because they bring a fresh viewpoint to marketing. And their youth is an inherent asset because they're marketing to an audience while simultaneously being that audience -- it makes it seem way more genuine and relatable. And Influencers are here to stay, so you can either work with it or against it.

Olivia Jade is getting skewered at Gomi right now, not because we skewer all influencers, but because she's the perfect storm of entitlement and crappy influencer tactics. Her sponsored posts are beyond fake, which to be fair, almost all sponsored posts are fake looking, but there is the occasional one that seems somewhat believable. She's not creative, she got famous through a blend of good looks and connections from her famous parents; she poses in a lot of makeup and duck face and collects her checks.

I see where you're coming from, but I also think that this is an unusually high-minded approach to take to advertising (and not one that people tend to take towards non-influencer forms of advertising). Like, you don't really see people getting up in arms about Clorox's TV ads being fake, or exactly like a million other TV ads, right? It is interesting to me that people place much higher standards on their influencer ads than they do on other ads. I guess a lot of it is because the influencer is always on some level marketing themselves and so you expect it to be 'real' whereas it's intuitively easier to view an ad for detergent with some skepticism. And, of course, plenty of influencers who I would guess fall on the 'bad' side for you are still gainfully employed so they have clearly been successful enough for companies to consider it worth the investment. It is interesting to me to see a trend that is in some demographics SO universally reviled and yet also clearly very successful.

(In case it's unclear, ximena, I don't think I actually disagree with you, your post was just a happy jumping off point for a bunch of thoughts I had going on )

[Mugsy]

Maybe because many of the influencers' videos imply they're just regular kids chillin' in their room and look, here's how I do my makeup! You can try it too because I'm just a regular kid like you! Whereas tv ads are known to be acted/directed, just like the rest of tv.

I don't understand how they can make money. I'll watch vid of someone making a craft or tying a scarf or whatever, but I'm not buying the same craft supplies or scarves just because they say use them. And I pay zero attention to the ads before/after/during the videos. Maybe I'm not typical.

[laurenj]

Mar 19, 2019 12:06:37 GMT -4 Mugsy said:

Maybe because many of the influencers' videos imply they're just regular kids chillin' in their room and look, here's how I do my makeup! You can try it too because I'm just a regular kid like you! Whereas tv ads are known to be acted/directed, just like the rest of tv.

I don't understand how they can make money. I'll watch vid of someone making a craft or tying a scarf or whatever, but I'm not buying the same craft supplies or scarves just because they say use them. And I pay zero attention to the ads before/after/during the videos. Maybe I'm not typical.

Yes, I think it's similar to the eye-rolling I do when a regular person posts a really obviously grasping pic of themselves and pretends it's just a candid shot of their day or that it's about something else. Like a pic supposedly about a new haircut or new outfit, but it's angled and cropped in such a way that literally all you see are boobs. Everyone knows the reaction they're hoping for has nothing to with whatever they've posted in the caption but they feel the need to disguise the intent, so it feels different from say, a Victoria's Secret ad or a swimsuit calendar.

As for someone like Olivia Jade, I'm sure part of the vitriol is frustration (and yes, some jealousy) that someone's life is that damn easy. Growing up in a house that looks like a resort, inheriting good looks and privilege from famous parents, and then this "career" that can give them earnings all their own mainly just from living the good life that they were born into...it's hard not to resent that on some level.

[Deleted]

Oh for sure petitesuite, on the surface there shouldn't be any difference between a commercial on TV and a "commercial" on Instagram. But like Mugsy said, there's a sort of perception that people are more genuine because social media feels more intimate. On YouTube for example, in the very early days of "influencers" (that word hadn't been invented yet), nothing was really sponsored. It was people like the Fowler sisters or Michelle Phan who loved makeup and hair and posted videos about products they bought with their own money. Companies quickly caught on to how valuable it could be to have people with popular followings post about their products and, well, the rest is history.

But lots of people have acknowledged that YouTube has gone way too far in the other direction, and it's not about products that people actually buy anymore. Influencers are sent products for free in PR or are paid to promote things, creating a massive conflict of interest and making their opinions invalid (a truly poor review is rare because they want to keep the freebies and sponsorships rolling in) and it ruined the whole point of YouTube, which was to exchange honest opinions about products that worked well or were awful. And it doesn't help when so many influencers like OJ don't need the money to begin with.

[petitesuite]

This is all true! It makes sense that people who can remember the 'good old days' (if you will) of youtube and instagram will feel differently about the proliferation of #sponcon* than those who have grown up with this as the norm. I am generally a late adopter, so I didn't really have a concrete grasp of what either of those platforms were like before they became so ad-heavy and I never had the expectation that product placement there would be anything other than a paid ad. (I do remember when teas that make you poop were less of a thing though...alas.)

*used ironically, I promise, don't @ me.

[Deleted]

I think it's a generational thing. I like ads to be clearly delineated from content. I don't even like product placements in movies and TV because it feels too much like a "trick." But I think the younger you are, the less you mind being marketed to constantly.

[tanyak]

I have this sponsored ad for Hello Fresh from Paige Petty Christiansen that keeps popping up in my FB feed. I guess she's some known blogger or influencer. I have no idea who she is. But this is the start of her comment:

I'm not only pregnant, but I have two toddlers that I refuse to take to the grocery store just so I can avoid the tantrums. I love that Hello Fresh helps me skip the grocery store!" (shilling continues)

Good Lord. I'm surprised the comments didn't shut FB down over the weekend. It seems now that someone is going in and deleting them daily. On the face of it, it's a pretty silly comment. If it was an actual commercial, people might roll their eyes, but because it's a real person, I think the thought is this crazy woman is letting two toddlers dictate her comings and goings. Is it fake or is it real life?