How to Make Celebrity Endorsements Actually Work for Your Game
Written by Marion Balinoff, an influencer marketing consultant with over a decade of experience, including six years in mobile gaming.
She has worked with top gaming companies like Wooga, Supercell, Bytro and Huuuge Games, running performance-driven campaigns with budgets ranging from micro-influencers to MrBeast. Known for her data-driven approach, Marion specializes in making influencer marketing measurable, scalable, and profitable for user acquisition.
Not many brands can say they've had LeBron James, Shakira, Jimmy Fallon, Kevin Hart, amongst MANY other celebrities featured in their ads. But Royal Kingdom can. Dream Games' campaign for their Match 3 puzzle title raises the common question: how much did it cost, and is it worth it?
The reality is, there isn't a standard measure. From the kind of celebrity and their relevance, to deliverables, production complexity, platform, usage, and more - many factors sway pricing.
Mobile gamer.biz provides a great breakdown of what these costs could look like - and raises the big question - But is there a way to MAKE the investment in celebrity ads worth it?
Are all celebrities equal? How do you choose the right kind of celebrity?
We've seen celebrities from various tracks in gaming ads - from Movie stars (Chris Pratt for Monopoly Go) and TV celebrities (Gordon Ramsay for Hay Day) to Sports stars (Erling Haaland for Clash of Clans), and music artists.
It’s hard to comment on the objective ‘success’ of a campaign without specific insight into the objectives and real spend - short-term spikes in downloads or revenue don’t translate to ROI if you’ve paid an obscene figure or you’re attracting players with a lower LTV.
But speaking of objectives, is there a difference in how these different types of celebrities stack up?
Naturally, bigger movie stars come with a heftier fee. So are the long-term performance outcomes really worth the short-term posterity?
Data suggests otherwise. Appsflyer's State of Creative Optimisation Report reveals that while 80-90% of the industry’s spend on ‘celebrity ads’ goes towards Movie Stars , they're outperformed by TV Celebrities and Social Media Influencers on Installs Per Mille (IPM) and Retention Measures across nearly all channels. Music Artists even outperform Movie stars on D7 Retention on Social & Search by over 50%.
When selecting celebrities, it’s key to have objectives clearly defined at the outset. Movie Stars could work when you’re aiming for broader appeal & brand awareness and if you can find a seamless fit. But for better performance outcomes, TV celebrities, Music Artists, and Social Media Influencers often deliver better results. The data also suggests that while Male celebrities draw bigger budgets, Female celebrities deliver slightly higher retention on Social & Search and comparable IPMs.
But whether you’re working with Movie, Music, or TV Stars or Social Media Influencers, it is important to learn to look beyond who’s making headlines at any given time.
Cultural relevancy isn't just tied to recency - particularly for older audiences. Focus on who consistently draws attention from your core target audience, not just who's currently trending.
This is part of the reason why TV Celebrities and Social Media Influencers also show better performance outcomes. They appear in people's lives regularly, building stronger audience connections. Fans feel they "know" them, creating deeper loyalty.
This is particularly true with stars of long-running shows or content formats (Jimmy Fallon, Gordon Ramsay) - they can remain in the spotlight for years with a consistent brand (personal and/or professional), unlike Movie stars, who can fade from public consciousness between projects.
Finding that perfect brand and audience alignment brings us to the next strategic consideration - optimising the ad creative.
Optimising the ad creative
The point of a celebrity collaboration shouldn’t just be to get people talking. It should be to get your core audience talking about it positively - and actually responding to the Call to Action (CTA).
Celebrity selection and ad creative go hand-in-hand. Beyond finding someone who appeals to your audience, bridge the gap between your brand's themes or unique selling proposition (USP) and what the celebrity is known for. The authenticity and alignment should be evident - without a relevant and engaging narrative, the celebrity ad risks becoming noise and a wasted investment.
Celebrity collaborations don't always need visually or technically complex productions. An engaging narrative can carry its weight, and your platforms and usage intentions will determine how much you need to invest in production.
Travel Town’s ads with Kylie Jenner are an interesting example. They’re a good example of the cheap to produce format - more ‘influencer-style,’ within her own home - no fancy sets, props, or equipment. But sentiment in the comments isn’t the best - there’s an evident struggle in understanding the alignment, and some unfortunate press picking up on the trolling. You definitely don’t want your ads going viral for the wrong reasons, so that alignment and ad creative are critical.
iOS Downloads & Revenue for Travel Town do see a spike in a window that would coincide with the attribution window for their collaboration with Kylie Jenner - however, there were noticeable additional updates and activations during this period so it’s difficult to isolate and attribute impact without internal insight.
Both revenue and downloads did see a higher baseline in the months that followed, so it’s likely there was a larger shift in marketing and UA strategy. Sentiment on the ad, however, doesn’t tell the most positive story - there is a perceived gap in authenticity and alignment.
A good way to step up the creative, take the partnership beyond a simple ad, and optimise towards performance outcomes- is to actually leverage custom assets.
Leverage custom assets for better performance outcomes
Custom assets integrate celebrities into the in-game experience through character skins, challenges, collectible objects, or events inspired by the celebrity.
While celebrity ads boost branding, especially when linked to a personal story or quirk, they're not always the most profitable route. Using celebrity content across all channels also complicates measurement and impact assessment.
The custom-asset route is a brilliant way to go beyond simple advertising, especially if ROI is an important KPI. They -
Encourage downloads and ongoing engagement
Provide measurable touchpoints to track partnership impact (challenge completions, character selection frequency, sales compared to average in-game items)
Can significantly boost performance - I've seen custom in-game assets boost ROI by 279% on average!
These assets can be adapted to any celebrity type from movie stars and TV celebrities, to sports stars and social media influencers.
That said, custom assets can’t be implemented overnight. Naturally, it’s something that requires close collaboration with the product team, and a heavy investment of resources.
That’s why it’s important to plan for custom assets well in advance so they can be built into the product team’s roadmaps. It’s always good practice to involve the product team AND the celebrity from the outset to ensure all teams are aligned on the timelines, concept, and so on. To ensure you’re creating something that’s within the team’s scope, it helps to send the celebrity a ‘creative briefing’ form that gathers their preferences amongst a few limited choices that are easier to create and implement for the team.
One way to minimise costs but reap the benefits of ‘custom’ assets is to tweak existing assets slightly - like colours and the name so it appears ‘customised’ to the audience. Although this approach still requires some work from the product team, it’s definitely easier than creating an entirely new asset from scratch.
You can also simply pick certain items already existing in the game and change the narrative to make them seem tailored to a celebrity. For example, I once used this tactic with social media influencers in a puzzle game - where we simply picked 5 items (already within the game) that ‘represented’ the influencer and created a ‘scavenger hunt challenge’ seemingly centred around the influencers.
Custom assets, whilst an effective tactic, can be a significant investment and need to be carefully considered, so it’s important to allow plenty of time and prior planning to pick the right celebrity and accommodate approvals, asset development, and the actual ad production.
I learnt the strings attached to custom assets the hard way - we once spent months developing a Christmas-themed custom asset with the one and only MrBeast. Cut to Christmas Eve, and I got a message saying the video planned for the next day wouldn’t be released - because Jimmy (MrBeast) was unhappy with it.
Naturally, 'christmas-themed' meant the asset had a very short and specific shelf life, and would be redundant after the 25th. But we weren’t in a position to negotiate. It was MrBeast, after all - he had tons of sponsors lined up, and we’d already invested tons in making the asset - in addition to his six figure fee. Make the agreement stricter? The celebrity or influencer just won’t sign. Argue too much, and you’ll ruin the relationship (and any chance of working with them now or in the future). The last-minute delay left us vulnerable - with no easy solution or quick workarounds.
We ultimately had to adjust roadmaps again to rework the asset, go through the approvals process again. The campaign ultimately ended up going live in MARCH. Three months later. Needless to say, it was a massive lesson learnt that custom assets should not be tied to seasonal events, and more importantly - that they're no easy feat to plan and execute.
Supplement celebrity collaborations with influencer campaigns
Supplementing celebrity collaborations with an influencer campaign is another key tactic to amplify reach, awareness, appeal, and impact, and extract the best outcomes from your celebrity collaborations.
This means you should run an influencer campaign to actually promote the fact that you’ve collaborated with a bigger celebrity. Supporting the rollout of your celebrity content across other channels with related influencer content helps -
Amplify reach and awareness through more organic and authentic voices
Influence positive sentiment around the celebrity collaboration
Expand campaign reach beyond the celebrity's immediate fans
I’ve leveraged this tactic for a number of games, promoting the celebrity ad and/or in-game asset with influencer content across TikTok, Instagram reels, YouTube, and YouTube shorts. Influencers play a critical role in shaping the cultural landscape today - so they’re a great way to shape perception around your celebrity content and rally more interest and conversions by inducing a fear of missing out.
Jen Donahoe and Sara Guerola also provide some great insights on working with Influencers and leveraging custom assets on our episode of Deconstructor of Fun, so it’s a great resource to check out for more best practices.
Summing up: How to make the most out of celebrity collaborations?
No two celebrity integrations are identical. Some brands have the budgets to go big, whilst others have less to work with. Ultimately, it’s about aligning objectives and strategy, and tailoring tactics to your specific needs & resources, keeping these best practices in mind:
Ensure brand alignment between the celebrity's personality/persona and your game's themes or USP
Verify they appeal to and are relevant for your core target audience
Conduct strict vetting for scandals or controversy
Consider your objectives - for performance, TV celebrities or Social Media influencers often outperform Movie Stars
Create engaging, relevant, authentic narratives
For performance goals, invest in custom assets when possible
Amplify impact by supplementing celebrity collaborations with Influencer activations
