Kylie Jenner posted a tweet today asking if “does anyone else not open Snapchat anymore”, and it may have caused $SNAP to plummet $1B in market share in a matter of hours.

I’ve mentioned this several times before on stage, and I still stand by it: The Kardashians have had a bigger impact on media than the Beatles.

The Kardashian effect is real, and it continues to grow. If they want to sell something, with one Instagram post or tweet, the product’s website almost always goes down. It doesn’t matter what they are selling.

Their audience buys it because the Kardashian brand matters more than the consumer brand itself. A note to all brand marketers out there: The new brands are people.

The new brands aren’t stuff. Richard Branson built his name up to power the Virgin brand, and Elon Musk is doing the same to create success for Tesla and SpaceX. If Kylie can cause a $1.3B impact in a matter of minutes with a single tweet, it’s time to take a closer look at the power of personal brands for your company.

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