when you see a tweet or an Instagram
post from one of your favorite
celebrities showing off the good life
with a cool outfit a new beauty product
or a beautiful vacation spot there's a
chance the star has a good reason to
tell you about it
money NBC's Joe Lincolnshire our Sunday
spotlight on influencers cashing in on
their legions of social media followers
[Music]
you might say Samantha Magni oneis
Instagram stardom can be traced back to
when her dog Aspen almost drowned
I started going off in my kayak and she
took off after me so she started like
huffing and puffing I thought she was
gonna drown so I went back to shore and
kind of stopped her into my kayak it was
this photo of Aspen happily snuggled in
her kayak to changed everything
sure I remember my husband distinctly
saying wow that's different the kayaking
pick won a photo contest and earned
Samantha new Instagram followers some
28,000 now who can't get enough of her
golden retrievers followers who want to
know not only how she gets
iseman into her kayak but also what kind
of kayak she's using a lot of people are
interested in the gear that I'm using in
my pictures interests that caught the
attention of advertisers who came
bearing gifts
that kayak free from or ooh dog food
free from new lo+ 500 dollars in
exchange for one post a month and that
watch from Garmin also in exchange for a
post a month and we were looking for an
influencer I was a female and who was in
the outdoor category and someone who was
also already using Garmin products mat
bound is creative director at Garmin
international he oversees a team of
eight scouring for people just like
Samantha who marketers call influencers
social media users with large followings
whose interests range from fashion and
fitness to photography parenting and of
course celebrities before social media
you know we relied heavily on
traditional mediums like print and
broadcast you know that forces you to
talk at consumers and be the interrupter
and now with social media you really
have an opportunity to be part of that
consumer dialogue major corporations
like coca-cola are cashing into Lauren
mega stars like Selena Gomez who can
make an estimated five hundred fifty
thousand dollars per post they store at
120 million plus followers it's very
effective it keeps that authentic bye
that people like to get when they're on
social media some forty percent of
people say they've purchased an item
after seeing an influencer use it on
social media contributing to a billion
dollar market this year alone five
billion by 2020 according to one
forecast it's money that's funneling
down to people like Natalie and Rossi
aka miss Hatton who quit her finance job
at JPMorgan to do the influencer
thankful time just like a risk that I
needed to take natalie is now closing in
on a half a million followers who love
her aerial photographs regardless of
whether or not those Kenneth Cole shoes
she's wearing were part of an
advertising deal deals she says can
range from 6,000 to 50,000 dollars I got
asked everyone wants to know how much
can you really make on an annual basis
doing it so I'm in the six-figure range
and yeah comfortable but all these
sponsored posts have raised some red
flags Selena Gomez is the most followed
person on Instagram how much exactly is
she advertising to us I think quite a
bit and more than many people may know
Bonnie Patton is the executive director
at truth in advertising so it's the Wild
West right now the vast majority of
social media influencers are not
disclosing that these are ads including
Selena's coca-cola post it only included
the word ad after a complaint saying the
post violated FTC rules which require
such disclosures with so many people
being influencers out there can the FTC
even enforce the rules today the FTC has
only brought four actions against
companies that have violated these
social-media influencer rules and that's
four out of thousands that are occurring
each and every day
leaving consumers to decide for
themselves whether or not they're under
the influence for Sunday today
Jolene Kent New York
[Music]
Joe thanks both coca-cola and Selena
Gomez declined comment for our story to
learn more about what it takes to be a
social-media influencer check out our
website at today.com slash Sunday hello
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