Marketing Insight: "Endorsements as a Strategy,” - The Making and Marketing of Professionals into Celebrities

 Read the following sources listed in the Marketing Insight: "Endorsements as a Strategy,”

a)    Irving Rein, Philip Kotler, and Martin Scoller, The Making and Marketing of Professionals into Celebrities (Chicago: NTC Business Books, 1997);

b)    Greg Johnson, "Woods Cautious Approach to the Green,” Los Angeles Times, July 26, 2000, p. A1; Bruce Horovitz, "Armstrong Rolls to Market Gold,” USA Today, May 4, 2000, p. 1B;

c)    Theresa Howard, "Pepsi Takes Some Fizz off Vanilla Rival,” USA Today, November 16, 2003;

d)    Keith Naughton, "The Soft Sell,” Newsweek, February 2, 2004, pp. 46-47;

e)    Betsy Cummings, "Star Power,” Sales & Marketing Management, (April 2001): pp. 52-59. 

Celebrity is the well known public figures who have high influencing power to public and are have high very large numbers of followers. The celebrities could be from any field such as music, dance, politics, sports and many more. These celebrities are often used as medium for communicating and flowing the message to the final customers. For this many companies hire and do the contract with well known celebrities as marketing strategies to influence high number of customers. This could help in retaining the old customers as well as attract new segments as well. Strong adverstisment campaign with the celebrity endorsement could be very helpful for higher sales of products and covering wider market share.

Celebrities are hired as brand ambassador paying millions of dollars for a single advertisement and extra charge as brand ambassador. They have power of influencing many follower, audience with their single appearance, speech or looks. This is because they are well known among public and often they are considered as separate from the brand. Their single view on the specific advertisement is considered as the sharing of their experiences and result shows so true and convincing to the public. Similarly their appearance on single advertisement makes a bigger difference in the eyes of customers. (Howard, 2003) The advantages of using celebrities are :

·Can influence the customers buying decisions

·Can build awareness about particular brand's product and services to potential and new customers

·Helps in creating the brand positioning in the market.

·Build trust and credibility of the brand. (smallbusiness.chron.com, 2015)

Everytime focusing on celebrity endorsement is not a good idea for the brand. This could costs companies to spend more on celebrities. It would not have any guarantee of 100% success as this leads to the future of company connected with the celebrity. Anything charge, mistakes or future worst case scenario with the celebrity could hamper the image of company so, attention need to paid during celebrity endorsement.

Reference

Howard, T. (2003). Pepsi takes some fizz off vanilla rival. Retrieved august 12, 2015, from usatoday30.usatoday.com: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/advertising/adtrack/2003-11-16-pepsi_x.htm

smallbusiness.chron.com. (2015). five advantages of using celebrities advertising . Retrieved august 12, 2015, from smallbusiness.chron.com: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/five-advantages-using-celebrities-advertising-34394.html