Networked Insights’ Research Analysts recently explored celebrity endorsement and product placement related to the pop music star Lady Gaga. For decades celebrity endorsement has proven to be a successful tactic to influence consumer preference. In the Social Intelligence Report: Lady Gaga we aim to help brand marketers understand how to find the right celebrity fit. Marketers have recently seen growth in product placement as represented in the upcoming James Bond film, which contains $45 million worth of product placement. Music videos have grown to be about a $15 million product placement industry, allowing brands to align their products with artist that appeal to their target consumer. In the Social Intelligence Report: Lady Gaga you will learn: product placements are a growing trend, and while there are many potentially positive opportunities associated with that, there are some strong potential pitfalls as well. And with the unprecedented amount of media coverage, access to information and levels of social sharing, there is an increased need for visibility in real-time around celebrities associated with a brand.

2. About this report
Networked Insights’ Social Intelligence Reports explore topics, brands, themes and celebrities
to uncover consumer trends and insights to inform decision making by marketers, brand
managers and their agencies. In this report, we examine celebrity endorsement and product
placement related to the music artist Lady Gaga. The data for this report was gathered from
March 1 through the end of May 2011.
For decades celebrity endorsement has proven to be a successful tactic to influence consumer
preference. Omnicom’s Dave Brown Entertainment offers brand marketers and advertising
agencies an independent index to quantify a celebrity’s ability to influence brand affinity and
purchase intent. Additionally, marketers have recently seen growth in product placement as
represented in the upcoming James Bond film, which contains $45 million worth of product
placement. Music videos have grown to be about a $15 million product placement industry,
allowing brands to align their products with artists who appeal to their target consumer.
How do you find the right fit for your brand?
2 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

3. Is Lady Gaga right for your brand?
Today, the clear leader among music artists attracting
brands for product placements is Lady Gaga, so we
chose her for a special analysis project spanning all
facets of the social web. The objective of this social
intelligence report is to show how well consumer
insight gleamed from the Internet can inform
decisions about choosing a celebrity, assessing
Lady Gaga’s video content, embedding a brand in
her video and gauging the benefits to be derived Virgin Mobile pl
acement from Lady G
aga’s “Telephone
from that. ” video
Usually, when marketers talk about product
placements, they base their decisions on what they I just went to my first Gaga concert in
think is popular – the classic “gut feel” approach. February (thanks Virgin Mobile!) and I
In the past, they haven’t had a definitive or particu- have to say, Gaga fans know how to bring
the fierce.”
larly fast way to learn how people actually feel about from collegefashion.net
someone like Lady Gaga. Yet such insights can be
critical if your company has very strict brand
requirements or a particular image to uphold in the
market — for example, staunchly conservative vs.
intentionally flamboyant.
3 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

4. Don’t be left starstruck
Consumer insights derived from the social web also can help you decide whether
you’re investing enough in the product placement to stand out. For example, Lady
Gaga has an extraordinary number of sponsors, including Virgin Mobile, HP, Diet
Coke, Compari, Chanel, Alexander McQueen, Phillip Stark, Nintendo, Burberry,
Chevrolet, Polaroid, Miracle Whip and Wonder bread — just to name a few.
So in a video cluttered with other products, will your brand be lost?
4 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

5. Doing it for the fame
The time frame during which we collected and
analyzed data was one of particularly high activity
for Lady Gaga, including her appearance on American
Idol, new album release, and a number of other
appearances and events. The data revealed that she 32% 39%
positive negative
has a very strong, solid, loyal fan base that drives a lot
of positive sentiment. At the same time, she is very
polarizing — in fact, 39 percent of comments cap-
tured during that three-month period were negative,
containing comments like “copycat,” “bizarre image,”
“don’t understand why she’s famous” and “not really
talented.” It’s fascinating how much persistent Is anyone Lady Gaga
watching Lady is a cheap
negative sentiment surrounds this superstar compared Gaga on HBO? Madonna copy.
to others we track. I love her Honestly, who
attitude, fashion takes her
When you’re thinking about product placement sense, voice... seriously...
with an artist like Lady Gaga, you want to weigh both -jezebel.com -music-mix.ew.com
aspects of sentiment. Yes, she has a No. 1 album. Yes,
she’s touring, is very successful and is on hit television
shows and covers of magazines. But she also stirs a lot
of controversy.
How might this affect perception of your brand?
5 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

6. What’s in your wallet?
The data produced another interesting nugget:
The household income of the most vocal Lady
Gaga fans is $25,000 to $75,000. This begs a
question about your target market — if yours is
a very high-end brand, will a product placement
in a Lady Gaga music video help?
Can her fans even afford your product?
‘
6 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

7. Engagement Trends Engagement Peaks
A
5000
C
4000 A. 2/11 “Born This Way” single released
B
3000 B. 4/19 “Judas” single released
2000
C. 5/5 “Judas” video debuts
1000
0
11/29 12/14 12/29 1/13 1/28 2/12 2/27 3/14 3/29 4/13 4/28 5/13
Monster trends
The verbatim comments and phrases that bubbled to the surface of the data analysis
were interesting, too. There were many references to Madonna and Katy Perry — in fact,
constant comparisons. Both of those artists are extremely controversial in their own right.
Madonna built her career on controversy, and she had a hard time attracting endorsement
opportunities, which may have paved the way for artists like Lady Gaga. Katy Perry has
gone a different route with skin creams and other products. So it’s interesting to see how
similar the three artists are in terms of generating controversy and yet how different the
story is when you look at the brands that attach themselves to these icons.
7 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

8. Mighty big words
Our report also features a “tag cloud” — a list of keywords that continuously pop up
during data analysis on a given topic. The physical size of the word indicates how
frequently it appears in the results. With Lady Gaga, you see words like “born” from
her song “Born This Way.” You see the words “fan” and “goo.” With another artist like
Katy Perry, you see “pretend,” “Kate,” “naked.”
If you compare the results for another artist who is slightly more conservative, such
as Sarah McLachlan, for example — she probably generates words like “album” and
“love.” So in an instant visual, you can see all of those keywords that are attributed to
someone — and those keywords will provide strong clues about the type of audience
that artist attracts.
8 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

9. Zynga
“It’s Lady Gaga inspired!!! May 17 to May
19 it will be GagaVille! So ready for all the
loony stuff I bet they’ll have! “
– www.farmvillefreak.com
Polaroid
“…the brand-new 3D polaroid (Lady Gaga
gives photography a new dimension).”
– drysafemarker.tumblr.com
Maintaining long-distance relationships
Looking at “share of voice” during this analysis time frame, Lady Gaga was working
with brands such as Virgin, Gilt.com, Polaroid and Zynga. Zynga was developing her
GagaVille app, and that app was announced during this period. She has had a long-
standing relationship with Virgin, and she often gives away mobile phones to the crowd
in the audience. So you have a very happy audience with cell phones in hand posting on
social media sites about how happy they are. At the same time, they’re implicitly and
explicitly promoting Lady Gaga’s sponsors. It’s a perfect marriage of the two.
So this type of activity adds another dimension to celebrity endorsement and product
placement.
9 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.

10. Don’t choose a Judas
The key takeaway from all this:
Product placements are a growing trend,
and while there are many potentially positive
opportunities associated with that, there are
some strong potential pitfalls as well. And with
the unprecedented amount of media coverage,
access to information and levels of social shar-
ing, there is an increased need for visibility in
real time around celebrities associated with a
brand. So marketers should fully understand
and weigh the risks before they make decisions.
Social intelligence can help you do both, giving
you the insight you need to enter into a
celebrity relationship with your eyes wide open
rather than going gaga over the opportunity
and regretting it later.
Questions about this report? Want a free consultation on how social data
Phone: 608.237.1867
can improve your media planning and other marketing? Contact us.
Web: networkedinsights.com
Email: info@networkedinsights.com
10 © 2011, Networked Insights, Inc. All rights reserved.