One of the latest endorsements that I can think of is 50 Cent and Vitamin Water. When you hear 50 Cent and Vitamin Water in the same sentence it does not sound right, but it’s true. 50 Cent has his own “Formula 50” vitamin water flavor and it is one of the best selling flavors of the vitamin water brand. 50 Cent actually went 1 step further than just plain endorsement, he bought 10% stock in Glaceau, the company that makes vitamin water. Because of this he always has vitamin water with him, at award shows and at his concerts. There was even a Vitamin Water advertisement that came with his recently released CD. Earlier this year Glaceau was sold to Coca-Cola for $4.1 billion dollars making 50 Cent over 400 million dollars from the transaction.

Not to go off in another direction, but what I really wanted to stress is that if you are selling a product or service endorsement can really help you out and it is easy to get, especially in the blogging world. There is ReviewMe, PayPerPost, and a few others. If you don’t think people use these services to get hype for their product look at John Chow’s blog. He has done 118 ReviewMe reviews! And at $400 per review people are glad to pay it to get the traffic and hype for their product. Remember sometimes it does take money to make money. I’m sure Glaceau is happy with what they have paid 50 Cent and what they got out of the endorsement. Being able to hype their product up to the point that Coca-Cola bought it.

Also if you look in the other direction at branding you can make a lot of money yourself endorsing products. If you can establish yourself in your niche your word carries more weight than other people in that same niche. That is why companies are willing to pay the money for the endorsement.