In the videos, launched last month, Reynolds encourages viewers to buy Dell products online as holiday gifts for friends and family.
The star of "Smokey and the Bandit" and "The Cannonball Run" isn't the only surprising casting choice. Playing the part of payment collector is eBay's PayPal. Dell typically lets customers purchase computers with their Visa or MasterCard credit cards. But with this new service, all payments go through a PayPal account.
"People are moving to using different payment options, and looking at this one in particular opened up a lot of opportunities," says David Clifton, Dell's marketing director.
Easier way to pay
PayPal's payment service is likely to show up on a lot of unusual sites this holiday season. In mid-November, PayPal released tools that let online shoppers use its service nearly everywhere online, even in cases in which the merchant doesn't accept PayPal. Online shoppers can download a tool bar that lets them use a temporary MasterCard number when making a transaction. Payments are then withdrawn from the user's PayPal-linked credit card or bank account. The payment is processed through PayPal and the merchant never sees the original account details. The system is designed to guard against identity theft and credit card fraud.
"PayPal is the safest way to pay online because we don't share your financial information," says Chris George, the senior director of financial products at eBay.
