BETC Paris: Back Market launches the biggest influencer campaign ever – all for free

An influencer campaign featuring the world’s biggest influencers, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Kim Kardashian, Kendall Jenner, 50 Cent, Ellen De Generes, Emma Watson, Kate Upton, and even the founder of Twitter? How did BETC Paris do it?

It’s easy if the influencers don’t know about it. Here’s the story.

Back Market sells refurbished smart phones and home electronics. It buys old products from everyday people (the biggest sector being smartphones), repairs them and fixes them up before re-selling them on the Back Market website. The idea found a very receptive audience in Europe, with changing consumer habits and an increased concern for sustainability. Now Back market wants to take its concept to the world – and especially the US.

But the US is still into everything new. So Back Market needed to appeal to a sceptical audience.

What if Kylie Jenner tweeted her desire for an iPhone 5, the agency reasoned. (Never mind that she did so in 2012.) It was impossible for the French start-up to pay the astronomical influencer fees of a Kardashian, but Back Market is into refurbishing, so the resourceful BETC simply refurbished an existing Kylie Jenner tweet. And responded to her desire by sending her an iPhone 5.

The partners did the same with old tweets by 311 more celebrities, making Ed Sheeran, 50 Cent, Katy Perry and many more the brand’s unwitting ambassadors. All for a media investment of $0.

Their entirely refurbished Twitter account, @backmarket, reveals Kim Kardashian’s love for Blackberry (“for life!”) and even Donald Trump’s impatience for a bigger iPhone screen (from 2013).