in: Public Relations - Celebrity
by: Haute House
Having a celebrity wear your product can be a brand changing experience leading to press and massive sales, but where do you even begin in terms of making that happen? The pros at Haute House PR (who work with celebrities constantly to make this happen) have outlined their Top Ten Don’ts that you should always avoid! (See their Do’s list HERE.)
SEE ALSO: [DOWNLOADABLE CLASS] Fail-Proof Your Outreach to the Press and Celebrities
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Act like a crazy fan around a celebrity you're working with. They get that enough, don’t you think? They want to be able to trust the team around them, and not feel used, or that you only like them because of their fame. You're just as important as them, so act like it! |
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Gossip about the celebrity you're working with to anyone. Don't sell any tidbits of information about them to tabloid editors. They'll never trust you again, and you'll ruin your relationship with the celebrity, and their team. |
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Try and push your brand too much on a celebrity. If they're doing an appearance and they have already picked a couple pieces to wear, don't push them to wear more, say more, do more. You can gently suggest it, but no celebrity wants to feel like they're selling out, or coming across as having an overly fake interest in your brand to the general public. |
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Contact a celebrity directly if you haven't before. Wait for the introduction from their team. If the intro never comes, continue to be professional and polite to the celebrity when you work with them, but don't ever reach out to them directly without given the green light from them or their team. |
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Expect a celebrity, or their handler, to tell you if the celebrity wore something. Ask the handler to let you know, but be proactive but scouring the paparazzi and tabloid sites daily for images. If you do spot an image, send it to the handler and say, she/he looks great! Thanks again for your help! (And then send the handler a gift, see #8 in DO’S.) |
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Wait to pitch out celebrity images to the press. Most tabloid magazines have a 5-14 day lead time, and blogs run images in real-time. They close their issues on Mondays, and go to press on Tuesdays, so the fresher the image/news is that you can give them, the higher the chance that they will consider including it. |
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Do a gifting suite where you pay thousands of dollars to gift your product to celebrities that you don’t know. Also be especially aware for opportunities to send product for “gift bags”, where you don’t even get to have a brand representative present.. Not only do you not know who is getting the gift bag, but there is ZERO chance that you will get an image of the celebrity wearing/using your item, a gift bag means they get it at the end of the event, and open it later. And there is no way for you to follow up, because you don’t know who actually got the gift. At least at gifting suites, the celebrities have the option to take a picture and you can control the situation a bit more, than with a gift bag. However proceed with caution, the game has changed since 2007. Tabloid editors want to feature celebrities wearing items around town, candidly, in their daily life. It shows the celebrities’ true interest in the brand. No one is interested in running forced, posed pictures of celebrities holding up items at a gifting suite. These events can of course be beneficial in some instances, but we highly recommend running them by your publicist, or someone in the industry before committing. |
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Ask a celebrity you're working with about any gossip you've heard about them. They'll assume you're selling the story, and it's just completely unprofessional. Would you want someone you work with asking you about your personal life? |
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Follow up a million times with a handler, if you gifted a celebrity a month ago and they still haven't worn anything. If they like what you sent them, they'll wear it eventually. Following up once with their handler to make sure they got the package is fine, but harassing them won't win you any points. |
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Wait too long for a celebrity's handler to tell you if it's ok to send them a package on behalf of the celebrity. If you follow up once or twice and there is no reply, try a different route to get the gift to a celebrity; whether it's through a journalist that's going to be interviewing them, an editor that's going to be shooting them, etc. Establishing your own tried and true route to get items to a celebrity is the hardest part. |
You dig? Now go get excited about some DO's by clicking HERE!
Kelly and Jordan of Haute House PR have recorded two classes with Tin Shingle for our .EDU program that you can listen to today to instantly help your PR and buzz-building skills:
> [PR]: How to Turn Press into Sales with Haute House PR
> [PR]: How to Host an Editor Preview to Show Your Product to the Press
Knowing how to pitch the media and celebrity stylists is a major step to securing press for your brand. At Tin Shingle, we empower small businesses, experts and young and established brands to make this happen through our unique membership program. Once you unlock membership, you can have instant access to Media Contacts at major magazines, Editorial Calendars, select PR Leads, an all-access pass to all classes in our .EDU Education Program, a connection to a trusted community of other businesses who are going through what you are experiencing as you grow your brand. Click here to learn more about membership with Tin Shingle.
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