Opinion

Fame used to be rare and centralised but now, thanks to social media, fame is everywhere. But it’s also fragmented and hyper-targeted. How do brands break through in this new world?

Elvis. Marilyn. Madonna. Prince. Beyoncé. Adele. Some stars shine so brightly they only  need one name. It doesn’t happen very often and seems to be happening even less these days.

Today, success is less about universal icon status and more about relatability and connection. Fame used to be rare and centralised — controlled by a few media powerhouses that decided who made it big.

Now, thanks to social media, fame is everywhere. But it’s also fragmented, potentially fleeting and hyper-targeted.

Death of universal fame?

Back in the day, becoming famous required a serious media machine. Print, radio and TV acted as gatekeepers, selecting a handful of people to turn into global superstars. If you made it, you were part of a shared cultural lexicon — recognisable to pretty much everyone.

The internet blew that model up. YouTube, Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat gave anyone with a camera and an idea a shot at fame. The result? A world where success is often niche, built within specific communities rather than across mass audiences. Some names do break through (your parents might know who MrBeast is by now), but many remain huge only within their own worlds.

Take Addison Rae. With 88.5m followers, she’s a powerhouse. But outside her core audience, she’s virtually unknown. That’s because fame today is specialised — it’s built within micro-communities, not the mainstream.

It’s also short-lived. Andy Warhol’s “15 minutes of fame” is now closer to “15 seconds in the feed”. The cycle of viral trends moves so fast that staying relevant requires constant reinvention. Compare that to Elvis, who cemented 21 years of stardom with a single TV appearance.

Why this matters for brands

So what does this mean for brand-building?

In The Long and the Short of It, Peter Field and Les Binet famously found that aiming for fame makes marketing more effective. It drives bigger business results faster. It also reduces price sensitivity — people are willing to pay more for brands they recognise and remember.

But here’s the challenge: universal fame is harder to achieve now. As Sir John Hegarty pointed out last year, media fragmentation has killed collective cultural moments. Today, audiences are spread across platforms, consuming highly personalised content.

Consider this: when Gavin & Stacey hit 19m viewers on Christmas Day, it was hailed as a cultural phenomenon. Twenty years ago, Coronation Street pulled in those numbers every time it aired.

Welcome to the era of fragmented fame. How do brands break through in this new world?

1. Fame now starts from the bottom up

Rather than being handed down from mainstream media, fame is now built in layers. Brands need to think less like Elvis and more like Rae. Success comes from targeting multiple niche audiences, then allowing those communities to overlap and build momentum.

Algorithms help make this possible. Instead of chasing generic demographics, brands should focus on communities with shared passions and interests. Over time, these connections add up, creating broader appeal.

MrBeast calls this interest market cap — the idea that if you combine high-interest topics that speak to different communities of interest (like Lamborghinis and hydraulic presses), you can reach an enormous, combined audience. Brands should look for similar ways to blend interests and maximise cultural reach.

2. Think like a meme, not an ad

For fame to spread, content needs to be emotionally engaging, culturally relevant and shareable. People don’t just consume content; they spread it.

The brands that win are those that entertain, spark conversations and break category norms. See how memes grow if you want to go deeper on this.

How memes grow and what that means for marketing

3. Move fast, but think long term

Success in fragmented fame doesn’t happen overnight. Brands need agility, they need content teams that think like creators and react quickly to trends, but they also require a long-term plan for brand-building.

The key is to strike a balance: move at the speed of culture while keeping a clear strategic direction.

4. Land, expand, remix

Fame doesn’t have to hit all at once. Brands can land in one community, expand into adjacent audiences and remix their message for new cultural spaces. This layered approach builds lasting recognition rather than just short-term buzz.

We might not be producing many new one-name icons, but fame is far from dead. It’s just evolved.

The question is: how will brands evolve with it?

New rules of fame

The way fame is built has changed. The days of 90-second TV ads delivering instant cultural impact are over.

Instead, brands need to:

• Embrace niche audiences at scale: Build fame by connecting overlapping communities through shared interests
• Prioritise emotional resonance and shareability: Create content that people want to talk about and share
• Balance agility with long-term thinking: React to trends without losing sight of brand-building
• Use a “land, expand, remix” strategy: Grow in layers, moving from niche to mainstream

Simon Carr is chief strategy officer and Lysette Jones is strategy partner at Hearts & Science

Every Thursday on The Media Leader is Strategy Leaders, where we ask some of the industry’s top strategic brains to discuss the future of planning, buying and the wider industry.  Read more Strategy Leaders here.