Lady Gaga using Shuttlerock's kiwi software

New Zealand visual marketing software company Shuttlerock has added Lady Gaga to its client list.

While on tour recently in Japan, the pop icon and social media guru asked her fans to upload photos of themselves to her Japanese website, and used Shuttlerock's software to help aggregate and display those photos. Photos from the campaign will be used to create a poster to be included inside the Japan version CD of Lady Gaga's upcoming 'Cheek To Cheek' album.

Shuttlerock was launched three years ago with a white label photo and content sharing platform that embeds on other companies' websites. It charges businesses a $500 monthly flat fee that makes it easier for them to use content from their customer of fan base, such as uploading photos and videos to their websites, and then republishing that user-generated content through social media channels.

Shuttlerock chief executive Jonny Hendriksen said it was a huge marketing coup for the Rangiora-based business to have Lady Gaga using its software.

"Lady Gaga is a) famous and b) more importantly, one of the most innovative leaders on how to use social media and has such a huge following. She's using this medium better than most companies do. This is a good example of how a huge brand whether it's a famous musician or a carmaker should be using the internet," he said.

Lady Gaga has 41.7 million Twitter followers and more than 67 million Facebook fans.

To promote the social media campaign, 'Universal Music LLC' created a digital billboard at Shibuya in Japan, the world's busiest pedestrian crossing, as well as posters at the concert venue and on campaign site.

Shuttlerock's more than 100 clients worldwide include ice-cream maker Haagen Dazs and carmaker Mitsubishi, the Queensland Reds and more locally the All Blacks, the Bank of New Zealand, Kiwibank and Fly Buys. It started a joint venture with digital marketing agency Opt in Japan and in July set up an office in Los Angeles as part of a bigger push in to the US market.

Hendriksen and business partner Tim Williams are the majority shareholders in Shuttlerock and previously founded ValueClick and ValueCommerce in Japan. Other investors include Air NZ director Paul Bingham, ex-Heinz Watties NZ operations manager Maurice Eng, radio host Gary McCormick and Japanese property investor Yoshihiro Kawamura.

(BusinessDesk)