No worries. You'll find a lot of fashion hauls on YT will show the same items from brands (pick, say, Zara and you'll find the same green dress, or H&M and you'll find the same lace white dress)- how are all the influencers gravitating towards the same pieces even if they have different body shapes and personal styles? Because they're all selecting from the same 20 pieces every 3 months. Once you have that info, you can see it all over the place. Jo Malone or Daniel Wellington were some of the other obvious ones that people missed at the time (2016-2018-ish iirc). Every influencer suddenly had the same candles and the same watch that they just loooved. Yeah right.
There's so much happening behind the scenes. I loved the strategy behind it but my personal ethics made me switch to a different field. I hated knowing that people thought these were honest recommendations from the influencers and couldn't tell it was product placement.
Indulge me here because I just remembered this...
The only other time I saw such obvious product placement was in the movie Antz. There's a scene where an ant puts out a cigarette by stepping on it. It's wearing Nike shoes. I conducted 3 focus groups (research for a dissertation) and nobody spotted it.
Though people started seeing obvious placements on TV and movies as time went on. The placements were still working effectively, putting a brand top of mind, but people were at least aware they were being advertised to.
But with YT, nobody noticed, it was so insidious! The personal relationship with the influencer is based on a 'normal' person connecting with you and sharing their personal favourites with you. It's so insidious. Even now when so many know that YT is nothing but product placements and advertising, a lot of people still click on affiliate links or believe blindly in the influencer's recommendations (like Sarah's stans).
Sarah had everyone fooled. That Timberland sponsorship was when she was living with her parents. At the same time, she would pick up fruit and nut mix from a local store to make her own vegan birthday cake (anyone remember those vlogs?). She was so freaking good at hiding the sponsorship, that even though I was paying attention out of professional interest, I didn't notice the shop was sponsoring her until the 3rd time I saw her vlogging it. She's very calculated and understands how to play the game. The fact that she has no personal ethics at all makes her perfect for this career she's chosen. But as people are becoming more informed about the industry, it means that she's unable to hide the sponsorships as well as she once did. She's being called out about not disclosing ads frequently now. It's a good sign.
Sorry again for the rant.
Edit: Found the old vlog with the health food store in it. Naked Foods. In fact, everything in that vlog was an advert (10 affiliate links in the description below this one video alone). Did everyone spot those sponsorships back then, I wonder?
Also, I loved her friend Tegan. She was authentic.