Intro:
The highly anticipated Presidential Election has finally arrived. In light of this national event, celebrities have been taking to Instagram to shed light on their personal voting experience, while brands have capitalized on the election. The meditation app Calm became the official sponsor for CNN’s election night coverage while Babe Wine curated an Instagrammable election night ‘survival kit’. Along with sponsorships and campaigns revolving around the election, Twitter is also teaming up with seven major broadcast networks to mitigate the spread of false news on the app. In addition to the election, the gap between mainstream media and social media seems to be closing, as stars and platforms expand to reach larger audiences.
Celebrity & Entertainment
JoJo Siwa Nominated for Her First People’s Choice Award
Social media stars are on the rise and are now being seen more frequently on traditional broadcast media. While still having a major presence on social media platforms, stars like Jojo Siwa are transforming the way celebrities and internet stars are being viewed. Last month, Siwa was nominated for the Social Star of the Year category for this year’s People’s Choice Awards. This nomination comes shortly after TikTok star Addison Rae was presenting at the Billboard Music Awards, which is another instance where influencers are crossing over into mainstream media. Award shows have notoriously been dropping in ratings and relevancy for the past few years, and with the miniscule attempts to involve social media stars, that is their way to gain and raise viewership.
Ryan Reynolds Speaks Out About Voting for the First Time
Now more than ever, there is a certain amount of pressure for celebrities and influencers to not only take part in the presidential election but encourage others to take part as well. For the past few months, most celebrity Instagram posts have been revolving around the election. One of them being actor Ryan Reynolds where he shared how this is the first election he will be participating in and the help he received from wife Blake Lively. Reynold's Instagram post stated, “This is my first time voting in America. I’d like to thank my wife Black for making my first time so gentle and loving. It was super scary at first, then exciting and now I’m a little tired. But proud. #VoteEarly”. With the post now accumulating over 3 million likes and outpouring support in the comments, Reynolds is not the only celebrity to be voting for the first time. Stars like Yolanda Hadid, Noah Centineo, Tan France, and more all took to Instagram to share their first voting experience.
Brands & Industry
Burger King Encourages People to Order From Sister Fast Food Chains
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to rattle businesses all over the world, restaurants and fast-food chains, in particular, are unifying and encouraging people to support their businesses. Taking a new approach, Burger King UK had tweeted out a statement on Monday saying, “We never thought we'd be asking you to do this, but restaurants employing thousands of staff really need your support at the moment” going on to mention other chains like McDonald’s, Domino’s Pizza, Pizza Hut, and more. Burger King UK also shined a light on the importance of supporting small businesses during this time, as they seem to be getting hit the hardest. This was a big step for a major fast-food chain to promote competitors and will be interesting to see if this type of unity will transfer to post-pandemic times.
Twitter Regulating Misinformation
In a world where fake news can easily be spewed out on social media, digital platforms are amping up their features just in time for the presidential election. This past Monday, Twitter released details about policies they will be partaking in to regulate the misinformation about the election. In doing so, the social media app also named the seven outlets they will be leaning on to determine whether the race has officially been called. These outlets include major broadcast stations like ABC News, AP, CNN, CBS News, Decision Desk HQ, Fox News, and NBC News. This is in short of prior complaints of Twitter being biased therefore Twitter sought out experts that have verified unbiased decision desks to diminish false claims.
TikTok Announces New Licensing Deal with Sony Music
In attempts to expand and diversify the variety of music creators can utilize on TikTok, the viral video app has announced a new licensing deal with Sony Music Entertainment. This deal enables creators to be ensured they are not using copyrighted sounds as well as provide them with a library including a wide range of songs. Viewing this deal from a musician's perspective, it benefits them greatly by exposing their music to a larger audience. This comes shortly after a viral clip of TikTok user “Doggface208” riding a skateboard to Fleetwood Mac’s hit Dreams. The clip has now surpassed 69 million views and led the 1977 album ‘Rumors’ to Billboard’s top 10 charts. This is just one example of artists making a comeback because of a viral posting on TikTok and is a great representation of how the app is able to be a powerful platform for new artists.
Meditation App Calm Sponsors CNN’s Election Coverage
The year 2020 has been full of stressful and unwanted events, and in light of the presidential election, the popular meditation app Calm has teamed up to be CNN’s sponsor for election coverage. As this collaboration seems to completely contrast each other’s content, Twitter data shows that there were 12 times as many tweets about Calm on Tuesday compared to the company’s average. According to AdWeek, Calm has additionally spent $12.6 million in advertisements resulting in a 220% increase compared to 2019. The response on Twitter seemed to have mixed reviews as some took it as the meditation app not being aware of the juxtaposition, while others viewed it as the app utilizing their message to bring calmness over a stressful situation.
Campaigns
Babe Wine’s Election Night Survival Kit
In the month of November, brands have jumped on the opportunity to incorporate their products with the presidential race. Babe Wine has capitalized on the idea that a majority of people following the race needs some type of relaxing outlet. The American wine brand curated an election night survival kit with entertaining stress relievers. The kit includes a pack of "doing great thx" tissues, a bottle of "Polls closing. Bottles opening" red wine, a four-pack of canned rosé, a pillow, and a squeeze ball. As the company has always been pushed by influencers, it has seen great success in sales by already selling out the boxes prior to election night. According to Thrillist, a rep for the brand commented on their intentions of the survival kits, “Knowing all people can do once they cast their ballot is sit back and wait for the final results (we know... easier said than done), BABE has released a cute (and functional!) kit to make waiting for the results a little more comfortable.”
Snapchat Launches Snap Connect as Advantage to Marketers
Social media apps are quickly evolving and expanding to new audiences and marketers faster than ever before. Platforms like Snapchat are turning their attention to its Snap Focus marketer with a new feature ‘Snap Connect’. According to SocialMediaToday, “‘Snap Connect’ looks to showcase internal experts on Snap's various direct response tools, providing a more in-depth perspective on how to make the best use of the various options at your disposal”. Essentially these new features are specialized courses to take the experience of advertising to the next level for brands and marketers. It allows for clear insights, product solutions, creative practices that are each tailored to a specific target audience. Brands looking to partake in social media advertisements should invest in Snapchat’s campaigns, especially if they are intended for a younger audience.
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