We all know celebrities get paid millions of dollars to endorse various products. It’s one of the many ways they make millions of dollars every year. One of the sectors that has seen a growth in, has been gadgets and technology.
Many celebrities are already carrying some of the most popular gadgets in the universe but there are some audiences that cannot be reached, that’s when companies drop millions into the bank accounts of these celebs to show off their latest product and reach the masses.
Here’s the Top 5 celebrities that made millions from tech/gadget endorsements this past year.
1. Catherine Zeta Jones for T-Mobile Phones
She was their pitchman three years ago with an annual salary of $20 million but after dumping her and trying other methods to attract customers, T-Mobile went back to Ms. Jones. Her first “new” ad aired after the American Idol Finale in May. The new advertisement touches on the cost benefits of going with T-Mobile over the other wireless carriers. Here’s the latest ad.
2. Ashton Kutcher for Nikon
Nikon signed a multi-million dollar deal with former PUNK’D creator Ashton Kutcher to promote their Cool Pix line of Cameras. He’s done a number of different ones. Here’s one of the latest ones from this past year.
3. Justin Long and John Hodgman for Apple
Apple has extremely smart marketing campaigns, and one of them involved these two guys. Justin Long (probably most famous for these ads) plays the Mac, while John Hodgman plays a PC. Different variations of these commercials have been around for some time. They usually have some humor, mostly directed at Hodgman for being a PC. Here’s one of their latest commercial:
4. Dwyane Wade, Charles Barkley for T-Mobile Phones
T-Mobile did a lot of advertising with these guys during the NBA season. Barkley and Wade have been doing these for a few years and have made a killing in advertising revenue. Some of these ads are really funny, especially when Wade makes fun of Barkley. They usually have some of the latest phones in the ads. T-Mobile is also the official wireless carrier of the NBA. This is by far one of their funniest ads, guest starring Yao Ming:
5. Jerry Seinfeld for Microsoft
In order to compete with Apple’s slew of “Get a Mac” ads, Microsoft decided to go with Jerry Seinfeld as their pitchman even though in his show, Seinfeld, Jerry had a Mac on his desk (left side of the picture).
Microsoft should have done their homework before hiring Jerry because you know in the internet age, things like this can be found within seconds.
Jerry Seinfeld was paid 10 million dollars to star in the commercials but Microsoft has stopped airing them, now going with their “Laptop Hunter” ads, which seem to be more effective.
This is the first Jerry Seinfeld commercial starring Bill Gates:
Here’s one of their last ones (it’s a long version)

July 22, 2009 02:14 PM | by

