But I guess now when you see somebody who has millions of followers and you've never
heard of them, those millions of followers might not have ever heard of them either.
Hi, and welcome back to me talking about whatever I want. Today, I want to talk about this new thing
that I've seen the Kardashians doing and this shady company that's partnering with them to do it
and why I hate it. But, first, of course, I like to do my comment shout out from my last video.
This comment actually goes out to the pressed noodle. That's kind of a mood. This person says,
"Now that D'Angelo will be uploading every day, I have a reason to go on YouTube every
day. What a gift." That's actually a really sweet comment. And perfect timing because we
are one week into my 200 day upload challenge. Now, did I miss a couple of days? Yes. Partially
because that's the way life goes, but also, this video took longer than a day to make.
It's kind of a big topic and I had to do a lot of research for it, but, basically,
influencer marketing has reached a new low. There's a sketchy company involved. There's
legal threats. Basically, it's a lot and it's called a follower loop. So, here's how follower
loops work. You start with an influencer. What better example than the Kardashians? For those of
you who don't know, the Kardashians are social media influencers and reality TV stars, best
known for their many... I don't know why they're famous, but I do know that they've used that fame
to their advantage because they are very sharp business women. They've turned their social media
presence into a multi multi hundred million dollar company collection and they are very, very rich.
So, you've got your influencer. We'll use Kourtney Kardashian as an example. Next, you have
said influencer pose with a bunch of expensive designer bags. Here, we see her with a bunch of
Louis Vuitton bags and a caption that says, "Busy day." Guess it was a bit of a light flex. Now,
what you might notice is that this post has 100000 comments. But I did a review called scrolling
through her Instagram and it turns out Kourtney Kardashian usually doesn't even get a fraction of
that number of comments. Let me show you another example. We'll use Kendall Jenner. The Jenner's
are Kardashians, right? I think. I don't know how that works, but they're related. Here she is
posing with a bag. You know what I want to know? Why do they not only include the purses but also
the packaging that the purses came in? It's like they want to declare to the world, I'm rich and
wasteful. Good for you, Kendall. Anyway, you may notice that this one just has no caption at all,
but it still has 100000 comments. So, besides these Khloe and Kendall posts, you'll find these
bag posts from Kim, Kris, Kylie, and... Khloe. Could you imagine if they had one more kid and
they just ran out of names to just misspell with a K? K'Charlie. Why did I just put that thought
into the universe? Now, it exists. I'm so sorry. Anyway, the point of all this is why are the
Kardashians posting with so many bags? And why do those posts have so many comments?
That's because that's phase three. You take your influencer, you have them pose with the bags,
and then you give the bags away. See, the captions on all of these posts have been changed after the
fact. This didn't initially say, "Busy day." It actually said something more along the lines of,
"Hi, everyone. Win $10000 USD cash plus all the purses pictured here with me. Yes,
it's for real. #ad." And so the rules to enter this giveaway are to go to @curatedbusinesses and
follow everyone they follow and, then, number two, comment on the post. The more I looked,
I started seeing these two step follow everyone @curatedbusinesses is following and then comment
on my post posts everywhere. So, the 100000 comments on Kourtney's post or the 100000 comments
on Kylie Kenneth Kopeland... Kendall Jenner's post, they were all entering these giveaways. So,
it's not really that much of a mystery after all. They're just Gucci giveaways. Honestly, who cares?
Nope, I'm just kidding. Video's not over. See, that's not enough for me. It's great to pretend
like Kylie and Kendall are just giving away Gucci out of the goodness of their hearts,
but obviously, there's money involved. So, I did some more research into how follower loops
actually work and who is hosting them and it's a little crazier than I expected. See,
in this whole game of follower loops, the people trying to comment on the post and win the Gucci
bags are not actually players. They're just pieces. Those followers are the commodity. And,
honestly, the Kardashians aren't really players in this game either. They're just the bait,
basically. The real players when it comes to follower loops don't actually show their faces
except for the host @curatedbusinesses. All right. So, here we go.
@curatedbusinessesptyltd. As you can see, they're verified and they have over 800000
followers and... Oh my gosh, their Instagram layout is terrible. I'm sorry. That's not
related to the video or anything. I just... The lack of aesthetic is killing me. This entire
website is just giving me suburban mom wine night invitation vibes. But, as you can see,
this is not just a horrible layout. It's also an archive of all the previous campaigns that
they've run. See, look. Here's Kendall Jenner's post and here's Kris Jenner as well. They have a
post right here outlining their 2020 campaign and, as you can see, it's all six of them. According
to Curated Businesses, it's their biggest lineup yet. So, I started getting really curious. Like,
I have literally never heard of Curated Businesses. How did they get to level where
they're having the Kardashians do promo for them? How much money are they making? Unfortunately,
I never did arrive at an exact answer, but after looking at their business model, it became very
clear that they're making a whole lot. So, I'm on their website right now,
which is extremely sketchy looking. Never trust a website that has a pop up and a bunch of text
boxes on the home page. I guess the point of this website besides the information is to try to
legitimize this company. As you can see, they have a whole media section. But I'm going to be honest,
this is the worst media section I've ever seen in my entire life. First of all,
some of these are tabloid magazines. That's not really inspiring confidence. Like, hey, guys! We
were in The Mail Online. We're legit. On top of that, one of these actually seems to be negative
press. Khloe Kardashian and Scott Disick are now giving away $12000 worth of Louis Vuitton bags
and the contest has the craziest rules. That's making your company look bad. Not only that, but
I also see the same article on here twice. Just on different websites. Yeah, the media section
of their website gets a one out of 10 for me. Next, I went to the about us section try to
just learn more about Curated Businesses and how they run things and... Oh my gosh,
it's even worse than the media section. First of all, this thing is just chock full of buzzwords.
It's like entire sentences strung out of buzz words. On top of that, their about section is
literally five sentences long. About us. We're not going to actually tell you anything. Just
email us if you really want to learn more. By far, though, the worst part of their entire website is
the frequently asked questions section. Question number one is, is this real? Which, according to
their answer, they have government-issued lottery permits. Their answer to is this real seems more
of an answer to is this legal, which I find very interesting. They also have a question that says,
nobody from my country/race/ethnicity has ever won. Why? Why is that a frequently asked question?
After seeing that, I decided to take a look at some of their previous winners because they do
have them all listed here. We have this lady right here, which I find it very interesting
that her picture is staged the exact same way that Kylie Jenner's and all those other
people's pictures were staged. She's even posing the same way. What's also weird though is that
comments are actually disabled on her posts, so. Now, I did look through the rest of the pictures
on this person's account and this is definitely a real person, but I didn't see any pictures of
her with the bags after that one, so I decided to keep looking. I also find this other person,
which... You may notice that her picture is also staged the exact same way that the Kardashians
are. Even down to leaving all the bags in the picture. I just don't... Why is that a thing?
Again, this is a real account and, in this case, I actually was able to find pictures of her with
the bags. But what I did find a little strange was she has one of the bags in the pictures
before she announces that she received the bags. Just thought that was a little strange,
but I'm guessing Curated Businesses made her go back and take a Kardashian style photo.
The last winner I looked was definitely the strangest because the caption was just sending me.
"You were wondering if this was real? Yes, this is more than real and it's amazing. This is the
happiest day and all, thanks to Curated Businesses and Kris Jenner. They are the best." Like,
if you want something to seem real, it's not a good idea to go online and say, "Hey, I know that
you all thought this was fake, but it's definitely not fake." Like, I could see if Curated Businesses
said that, but to have the lady herself say it just makes it seem fake. But that wasn't the
only weird part of the post. She also got the bags weirdly fast. Like, she announces on March
2nd that she won the competition, which good for you, but then on March 3rd, she has all the bags.
How did she get the bags in less than 24 hours? This person right here says, "Didn't she just win
yesterday? How did she get the bags so quickly? Something seems fishy about that. She wouldn't
have received them all that quick. And the fact that she needs to try and convince everyone that
this competition is real in her caption... I don't know. Something is definitely off with this one."
Which is true because, bottom line, even if the bags are real, these people are going out
of their way to make it seem as suspicious and fake as possible. Someone else said,
"They choose the winner before they post it. You can read the information in their extended
terms and conditions." But then Curated Businesses actually replies and says, "We take our business
and credibility very seriously. Some people simply cannot be pleased. She won Monday, shipped Monday,
and delivered Tuesday. What's so odd about that? This winner was close to our LA office
and if you continue to make baseless claims in a public forum, I will seek action. Unfounded and
defamation. My company is a legally run marketing company and we will not continue to allow these
untrue comments to circulate. No wonder our winners want to quickly go back to private
accounts. So many people ruin their win with silly comments like this." Holy crap. Why are you
so triggered? What? Are you going to try to take action against this video because I'm pointing out
how weirdly fake everything you're doing sounds? Like, if you want my official verdict, no, I don't
think that these are fake. I don't think the bags are fake. I do think that there are real winners.
But to react so strongly to people saying, hey, you're going about this in kind of a shady way,
is insane. On top of that, they have a separate account named Curated Businesses Legal. It's
such a lame power move. Curated Businesses will tag their Curated Businesses Legal page to come
and show up and intimidate people. "Please cease and desist with your defamatory comments and wild
accusations that are simply not true." Fun fact. I don't think you can send a cease and desist in
the Instagram comments section, but that's just... I'm not a lawyer. What would I know?
Honestly, this company just seems terrified of being called fake, which is weird because if
you're not fake, then just host your giveaways and ignore the people. I don't know. It's weird, okay?
It doesn't help that all of the posts sound very advertise-y. The winners are like, oh, guys, it's
definitely real and also not fake. It doesn't help that every single photograph that the winners take
is staged the exact same way as the Kardashians' photos. They say they don't send photographers
over and, if that's the case, it makes it seem fake to have your people stage it the same way
as you stage the professional ones. Honestly, they just have the worst PR team of all time.
On top of that, I saw weird stuff, like people asking, "Hey, I would be excited
if South Australia was eligible. Why are we never eligible, but the rest of Australia is?"
To which Curated Businesses said, "They just won't allow it. Ship to a friend's address.
There are ways around it." So, you don't have a permit to host this kind of competition in certain
parts of Australia and you're trying so hard to seem like you're doing everything legally, but
then you're telling people, oh, just use a fake address. That way, we can get around not having
the permits in your area. Honestly, your PR team gets a two out of 10 for me. Please try harder.
So, that left me with my last question about the follower loops. See, we know who the influencers
are. They're the Kardashians and some other people. We know who the company behind it
is. Curated Businesses and they're just awful. But I want to know who is paying into these.
Who are the people you have to follow to win these giveaways and how much is this doing
for their accounts? Well, I did some digging through their website and... Oh, no. Follower
loops don't work people. This is one account, @mushyco. They sell baby supplies, I guess. Now,
notice how they have 667000 followers, but they get fewer likes on their posts than I get on my
Instagram. I went to their Social Blade for their Instagram and they are losing followers almost
every single day. There's this other account named @ggcbikinis and they have 156000 followers,
but some of their posts get as few as 300 likes. That's terrible. On their Social Blade,
they don't lose followers almost every day. They lose them actually every day.
That's when I realized. The scam is not actually the Gucci bags. I don't think the people joining
and following all these people to try to get some free designer are the ones being
tricked. I think the companies and the brands trying to buy into these games are the ones
being scammed. Curated Businesses is like, oo, we'll send followers to your account,
but what good is that if all the followers are just going to unfollow every single day for the
rest of your account's life? These follower loops don't grow your following. They just temporarily
increase your follower count. And there's a huge difference. Brands don't pay you because you
have 667000 followers. They pay you because of how many likes you're getting. If it's 300, I'm sorry,
my guy, but you're not going to get that much. When you really step back and think about it,
why would these follower loops work anyway? The 100 million people that are following
Kylie Jenner, they don't care about Mushy Co baby supplies. So, if Kylie Jenner is like,
hey, go follow these people so you can win some free Gucci, they're just going to unfollow once
they don't win. The only thing participating in a follower loop does is just make your account
look dead. Seeing as there's 75 people, how much are they actually paying to get into this? Like,
does each person pay $1000 to get that boost, then, Curated Businesses makes $75000? I mean,
that would cover the Gucci bags. What if each person is paying $10000 to get in. Is Curated
Businesses making $750000 a post? Who actually knows how much they're making from this campaign?
I wanted to see what kind of Instagram accounts were buying into this currently because they're
actually running a campaign right now. Sofia Richie is giving away Gucci bags and, to win,
you have to follow the 75 people that Curated Businesses is following at the moment. I look
through these people and would it be wrong if I said these seem like the exact kind of accounts
that would try to purchase 100000 followers at a time? Some are companies and some are influencers,
but almost all of them already have 100000 followers and a lot of them are verified. I
see this guy right here, Patrick Bet. He has 2.7 million followers already. Why would you need to
buy more at that point? Also, it's worth noting that I've never heard of this person. But I guess
now when you see somebody who has millions of followers and you've never heard of them,
those millions of followers might not have ever heard of them either.
Let's see. I see Janky and Guggimon. They're these artificial virtual influencers. They're
like animated avatars that wear expensive clothes and get brand deals off of it. But I guess they
were a bit more artificial than we thought since they're just buying their followers.
I see Talentless. That's Scott Disick's clothing company. Isn't Scott Disick an actual celebrity?
Like, not just an influencer. I guess a million followers on his clothing brand wasn't enough. Oh,
look. It's not only Bing Energy, but also the Bing Energy CEO trying to get some fans off of
Sofia Richie. That's probably the least surprising one out of all of this. Oh,
wow. Nicole Arbour's there, too. Now, I take that back. That's the
least surprising one out of all of this. So, yeah. That's the latest batch of people
who are probably going to get an additional 100000 followers in the next day or whatever
and that's how a follower loop works. It's not even a loop, if we're being honest. It's more of
a follower transfer. Like, you're just paying this company to be a middle man in the hopes that Kylie
Jenner will transfer some of her followers to you. I truly think that this represents
everything wrong with influencer culture at this point because the point where you are buying a
higher follower count, then the follower count is just a number. I'll use myself as an example. I
have 216000 subscribers on this channel, but I do want more subscribers. I want a million people to
look all the videos I upload every single day. Two million, three million. But I want them to
be real people. I also don't understand the point of this because you don't get brand deals because
of how many subscribers you have. You get them based off of your views and likes. As you can see,
paying Curated Businesses to have Kylie Jenner do charity work for you does not
really increase the amount of likes that you get. So, this whole thing is just pure vanity.
But yeah. That's the story of how the Kardashians are using their followers as pawns, currency,
whatever you want to call it, and just kind of willy nilly pawning them off to other celebrities
on the Instagram by using Gucci bags as bait for people who can't afford them. I'm just going to be
honest with you. If I had the chance to win 20 Gucci bags and all I had to do was follow a few
people on Instagram, shoot, I might join Curated Businesses' next campaign. Honestly, who cares?