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The Official Spokesperson

Testimonials may use anyone as a spokesperson, but when they can afford it companies like to get big name stars.  Marie Osmond has lost 45 pounds using NutraSystem.  Tony Orlando lost 103 pounds. Oprah has lost several hundred pounds, over and over, to a variety of weight loss programs.  It is actually easy to get a known spokesperson to do an ad for your product. Even I can do it on my Slightly Creaky site.  For under $500 Flash Video Actors.com will arrange a script, an actor, and do the filming.  Live Personalities.com will do a 30-second commercial for $499 and a 60-second one for $549. 

Do actors need the money so badly, or are products manufacturers so much in need of testimonials?  Some spokespersons have actually promoted products that have gotten them into trouble.  Many others use actors pretending to be customers or even dignitaries such as doctors, lawyers, and other experts.  The small print states that the commercial is a dramatization.

TitleMax, a loan company in the South, uses local celebrities to push their product.  Here is what one former company employee said about their hidden policies: “I am a former employee of TitleMax of TN. Titlemax uses catchy TV commercials with testimonials from satisfied customers along with print advertisement to seduce hard working lower middle class people into pawning their vehicle. They tell you over the phone that they charge 'about half' of what others charge. The interest rate (and fee's) come to 12.9% MONTHLY (which is 154.8% APR).”

On occasion what you think you see is not what you get.  The top-selling cholesterol drug, Lipitor, which featured artificial heart inventor Dr. Robert Jarvik, used an actor rather then the doctor himself in some scenes. 

One must wonder whether Viagra commercials did more to get Bob Dole’s name known than his presidential race in 1996.  Some voters found it strange that John McCain supported the use of Viagra while arguing against forms of contraception.  Soccer great Pele also did commercials for this product.

Some of the more famous product endorsements include

1. Ed McMahon and Dick Clark for American Family Publishers. This company lost numerous lawsuits for misleading advertising including a $1 million fine in Florida involving an ad that featured Mr. McMahon
2. Bill Cosby made almost as much money doing ads for Jell-O, Eastman Kodak & Coca-Cola then he made for his movies.
3. Our all time favorite space actor, William Shatner is better known for his PriceLine ads than for his award winning TV and movie roles.  Priceline has been criticized for two of their unadvertised policies: All transactions are non-refundable, and reservations cannot be changed even by paying a penalty.
4. Phil Rizzuto was a long-time spokesman for The Money Store.  This company has been cited, among other things, for illegal home foreclosures. Using the name “Mortgage Lending Direct,” The Money Store engaged in providing illegal mortgages in many states.  This part of the company was closed down by governmental authorities.  In their ads they stated no points and no origination fees, yet investigations showed they typically tacked on up to 6% for such fees, hidden in small print among many pages of documentation.  In 2008, nine Money Store franchise owners and employees defrauded 110 home owners in Washington DC of $35 million.
5. Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev appeared in a Russian-language commercial for Pizza Hut.  The advertisement was eventually shown in the United States.  This was the man who once said, “I am a Communist, a convinced Communist! For some that may be a fantasy. But to me it is my main goal.”
6. Jessica Simpson and Sean P Diddy Combs have all done advertisements for the Proactive line of acne medication, about how it got rid of their acne and led to their acting success.  I never knew either of them were actors.  If they are, they should fire their make-up consultants.  Proactive uses misleading advertisements to get you to try their product.  If you do not cancel within 14 days of the initial order, and usually that’s before the product actually arrives, you get placed on their automatic shipping list and will be billed $45.95 monthly.
7. The cavemen of GEICO fame could not survive the real life of television.  Their show was cancelled after six episodes and gathered a final Nelson ranking of 107.

Adding their name to a product can bring actors and actresses a large residual income, even long after they are dead.  The heirs to Roy Rogers still get paid for the use of the name, as do the estates of Jimmy Dean and Paul Newman.  Consider all the people who let their names be used on clothing lines.  Interestingly some of them have received Mr. Blackwell’s Worst Dressed awards over the years. His list, from 1922 through his death in 2008, included Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, Madonna, Farrah Fawcett, Cher, and the always well popular Dennis Rodman.  Each of these has had clothing lines, cosmetics, or similar fashion products named after them