There Is Why You Are Seeing Celebrities Promoting Fintech Products, and it Will Definitely Surprise You

The financial world is slowly yet increasingly taking advantage of celebrity influencers to promote their products to customers. In that spirit, Klarna, a banking company based in Sweden, has signed Snoop Dogg to become its new face in their upcoming advertising campaign, offering the musician shares in the company in return. This is not the first time that celebrities have signed on with financial companies to endorse their products, as Will.I.Am and Akon, to name a few, have also done the same in the past.

Snoop Dogg would be involved in a variety of ways with Klarna, apart from his appearance in a video called Get Smoooth. According to Forbes, the musician would also be promoting the brand on Reddit, and the trading app called Robinhood, which involves Dogg as one of its investors, will also be collaborating with Klarna and help it expand business in the European region.

Snoop Dogg has invested in Klarna and is now also the new face of the brand

Social Media and Fintech

With the growing influence of social media on consumer behavior, the effectiveness of promoting fintech on the medium is still a question mark. Although many lifestyle product categories such as fashion and beauty have found social media promotions to be quite rewarding, it is yet to be seen whether fintech brands would find the same kind of success.

And it has become very important for fintech companies to establish themselves as brands, considering the increasing number of companies offering the same kind of products. Now, in order to attract customers, these companies must differentiate in the way they promote their products and using an untested medium such as social media seems like the most viable option, regardless of whether it would be successful or not.

But this increasing attention on promoting themselves as brands has resulted in Fintech companies approaching advertisement in the traditional manner, and the hiring of Snoop Dogg by Klarna is the perfect example of that. Although this makes complete business sense, it may not be the most sustainable option if the goal is to retain customers in the long run.

Fintech companies are looking towards establishing themselves as brands considering the highly saturated market

Would Celebrity Endorsements Work For Fintech Companies?

The fintech market is very different, and although the presence of celebrities in their adverts may grab the attention of potential customers, the buzz is likely to die out once a competitor comes up with a newer, fresher campaign with some other celebrity.

For lifestyle products, celebrities offer an aspirational appeal to the products which sticks to the minds of consumers even long after a campaign has ended. With fintech, the case is different, both because financial products are much more complex to understand, and because customers may not trust celebrities to be actually making those investments.

Celebrity endorsements for financial products are not being considered completely harmless by regulatory authorities, especially the SEC which has issued warnings stating that customers should not base their investment and finance-related decisions simply because their favorite celebrity is endorsing the same. It had become necessary to issue such a warning considering the increasing number of celebrities who had begun to endorse financial products to millions of their follower on social media and other mediums.

Although celebrity endorsements work very well in order to establish lifestyle brands, only time will tell if they work the same way with fintech products

Many Celebrities Are Endorsing Financial Products

Snoop Dogg is certainly not the first celebrity to associate himself with a financial company. The musician Will.i.am has associated himself with Atom, a bank in the UK which exists only via an app, as one of their advisors, providing them insight into the different aspects of culture and charity, and also technology. While technology may not seem like the strong suit of Will.i.am, the fact that the musician has previously partnered with Intel and launched i.am+, a hardware setup, goes to show that he does have past experience in the field.

That is not all. The musician Akon has also made his mark in the fintech industry by launching his own brand of crypto-currency called Akoin, although his motivation with it is much nobler than making a profit. Through Akoin, Akon hopes to afford the African people the opportunity to use this currency and take back control of their money from the government, eventually paving way for economic advancement.