Here's a short list off the top of my head:
She just won Dancing with the Stars.
She's going to be releasing a solo album in the near future.
She's the lead singer of one of the most popular/successful female groups.
She's too good at what she does that the 4 other members of PCD had to quit because of jealousy, and so now there's 4 new replacements.
She's been featured in a few songs.
She has over 120,000 twitter followers, that's impressive i guess.
She has a cool website:
www.hernameisnicole.com
She's hot.
She's been a judge on a few music shows such as 'the sing off' that appeared on NBC.
She's really popular world wide, mainly due to PCD. Also her boyfriend, Lewis Hamilton, does F1 racing which occurs in different countries world wide.
She's hot.
She can speak russian.
That's all i can think of now =/
But i guess she's getting some recognition because of her Dancing with the Stars victory.