Celebrity Endorsement's Impact on Modern Business Marketing

This essay delves into the strategic utilization of celebrity endorsements as a potent marketing tool in the contemporary business landscape. It meticulously examines the multifaceted aspects of celebrity endorsements, encompassing their definition, the rationale behind their widespread adoption, and the mechanisms through which they generate consumer interest and positive media coverage. The essay further investigates the influence of celebrity endorsements on consumer purchasing decisions, the overall branding of businesses, and provides a balanced perspective by addressing the potential drawbacks associated with this marketing approach. Through scholarly articles and real-world examples, the essay provides a comprehensive analysis of the subject, offering valuable insights into the power and complexities of celebrity endorsements in the modern marketing arena.

Celebrity Industry

Table of Contents
Topic of Essay “How Celebrities Endorsement is used as a marketing tool in today's business
world”..............................................................................................................................................1
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6

Topic of Essay “How Celebrities Endorsement is used as a marketing tool in
today's business world”
In today’s competitive world, in order to distinguish own identity and brand from the rest,
companies strive out to gain leverage. Here, celebrity endorsement has become the most popular
choice for business world to reach potential customers and bring awareness in them about their
products and services (Negi, Fern and Jeedigunta, 2018). This essay paper explores the main
potential of celebrity endorsements that taken as a marketing tool. Here, it is discussed why and
how celebrities’ power is used by business to reach their targeted customers. For this purpose,
some arguments are made as per scholarly articles on given key questions as -
 What is celebrity endorsement?
 Why mostly all companies are scrambling to get a celebrity for endorsing their products?
 How celebrities generate more interest and positive press?
 How does celebrity endorsement aid organisations in influencing consumers purchasing?
 What is the impact of celebrity endorsement on overall brand of business market?
 What are the drawbacks of using celebrity endorsement?
Celebrity branding:
As per the article given by Kevin Harrington (2014), it has been identified that if a
company has a great a product but not effective branding, then it may lead to impact directly on
its sales (Celebrity Branding Is Making A Comeback - Tips for Success, 2014). In this regard,
celebrity endorsement is considered as most powerful too that helps in boosting a brand. In order
to make plan to get star power for branding a product, it is essential for a firm to understand what
is celebrity endorsement. This term refers to a tactic that features a famous person in order to
offer an endorsement of a brand (Garg and et. al., 2017). For endorsement, famous person can be
an athlete, actor, musician, sportsperson, politician or more.
As having a celebrity to advertise is considered as a powerful tool for marketing,
therefore, to reach target audience, companies do not tend to introduce an international stars.
They choose only national celebrities who are familiar with targeted audience because people
mostly idolise those famous persons who have done something for their nation. Celebrities add
brand value of a company that refers to immediate and palpable (Addo, 2016). Therefore, when a
famous person signs an endorsement contract with a company, then it raise an element of
legitimacy i.e. give power to a brand for backing it up (Gong and et. al., 2017). Thus, any brand
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which inks an endorsement deal with a celebrity then it leads to stock rise up as soon as the
product is made public. It represents an increase from endorsement of celebrity in perceived
legitimacy even though the features of a brand have not changed at all.
Companies are scrambling to get a celebrity for endorsing their products:
According to the article published by Market Bliss Media (2019), it has been analysed
that in case of bringing awareness among customers, celebrity endorsement is considered as a
form of advertising, where a company can use power and fame of famous persons for promoting
their brands (5 Reasons Why celebrity endorsement works, 2016). In Australia, mostly branded
company endorse business through Kendall Jenner in Bec and Bridge, Anna Quan and Lee
Mathhews standouts at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, Kim Karadashion, Hugh Jackman, Selena
Gomez and more. These celebrities are associated with different-different field and endorse
brands of famous companies (McCormick, 2016). The main reasons behind why companies are
scrambling to get a celebrity for endorsing their products is – people tend to purchase those
products only that popular stars promote. Therefore, when a company use celebrities branding
then it catches attention of viewers more and arise willingness for purchasing the same products.
As stars' fame as well as their success stories are inspired people to become like them. So, use
fame of them as a marketing tool, helps organisations in reaching potential customers and
enhance sales performance more efficiently. Along with this, usually celebrities also post product
on their fan page which ultimately lead to promote a brand. Stars having great reputation in the
eyes of followers (range from 12 to 64 years old) are prone to reach targeted customers.
Celebrities generate more interest and positive press:
In today’s highly competitive market, organizations use celebrity endorsement in
advertisements. Due to development in the field of mass communications, celebrity endorsement
is considered as one of the oldest branding tools, that keep its effect in generating more interest
as well as positive press among customers. According to the journal given by Johannes Knoll,
Jörg Matthes (2017), it has been analyzed that without effective marketing tool, a company
having greater value of product still can’t generate more interest among targeted customers (The
effectiveness of celebrity endorsements: a meta-analysis, 2017). Therefore, roping in a famous
person might be taken as solution to this problem. Hereby, using fame and power of celebrities
who are positively involved in public relations will provide advantage to draw attention of media
outlets towards company products (Laudon and Traver, 2016). In order to generate interest,
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companies used to announce about whom they are endorsing for their brand by hold a press
conference and invite various media partners over there. Through this process, releasing press
conference would bring awareness among fans and followers about which product their
celebrities are using. Henceforth, this would give opportunity to use celebrity endorsement as a
marketing tool which can be converted further into sales and revenue returns.
According to perception of Chen (2018), endorsement can be defined as a marketing
channel to communicate a brand of a company through a celebrity spokesperson. Hereby, a
communication channel can be taken as a way through which a firm communicates its offerings
to targeted customers. Celebrity endorsement is also taken as promotional tool which taken as
brand awareness. It is also known as way to enhance credibility as well increase visibility of a
brand. Celebrities can also shine a bright spotlight on overall all types of businesses, therefore,
they are sought out to advertise products or services of a company. But typically, only large and
big companies have capabilities to apply celebrity endorsement for marketing brands. While
firms operate on small level due to shortage of financial sources, unable to take the same
opportunity for promoting their brands by using fame and power of celebrities.
Celebrity endorsement aid organisations in influencing consumers purchasing:
According to the article given by Hawshaw Elkins (2019), it has been evaluated that
whether a celebrity is a pop singer who is promoting soft drinks or any brand then it becomes
hard for followers to ignore the same (The Effect of celebrities in advertisement, 2019).
Celebrities have power to gain attention of people and influence them to purchase a commodity
that they are endorsing. Featuring famous persons in advertising aid company to influence
customers immediately and enhance a brand (Negi, Fern and Jeedigunta, 2018). Therefore, it has
been considered as a high-impact marketing tool that influence consumers purchasing power and
generate willingness among them to purchase a brand. Along with this, celebrity endorsement
also refers as a promotion tool for marketing a product or service by using fame of them. For an
instance, a famous sportsperson like an athlete can endorse a specific product of a brand like
athletic footwear, protein drinks and more (Garg and et. al., 2017). In this regard, appearance of
such famous personalities in commercials advertising for a particular brand, gain high attention
of their followers and positively influence their purchasing power as well. During games either
on state, national or international level, when sportsperson wear t-shirt, footwear and more, help
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in promoting a brand more efficiently, which is considered as a classic example of modern
advertisement technique i.e. celebrity endorsement.
Another example to evaluate how celebrity fame can influence purchasing behavior of
customers, is Nike. This brand is well known for its celebrity endorsements for promoting
athletic footwear (Addo, 2016). It has a number of successful celebrity endorsement campaigns
such as basketball or golf, where Nike has seen to gain a high benefit from endorsements like
Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods. Therefore, this brand has a high power to reach targeted
people due to large celebrity networks and different mediums. For this purpose, endorsing
celebrities through commercial advertisement on social media, television and more, helps to keep
celebrity effect on brand and enhance sales performance as well (Gong and et. al., 2017).
Impact of celebrity endorsement on overall brand of business market:
Today, business world has become highly complicated and dynamic due to presence of
an intense competition (Chen, 2018). Here, in order to gain competitive advantage and diversify
own products from the rest, a company implements a number of policies and marketing
techniques like social media advertisement, commercial ads and more (Impact of celebrity
endorsement on brand, 2019). But all these processes have failed to long sought to distract as
well as attract the attention of potential customers more effectively. Hereby, using celebrity
endorsement is considered as the most effective way for promoting a brand because of ever-
increasing commercial bombardment. In this regard, as people mainly of age 16 to 64 years are
exposed to millions of voices as well as images in newspaper articles, magazines and
on websites, billboards, social media, radio and television (McCormick, 2016). Therefore, every
brand attempts to build a strong image to get higher attention of targeted customers.
Furthermore, due to constant media saturation which most customers experience daily, they
eventually it become numb for business to the standard marketing techniques. Thus, to find a
hook which will hold the customers’ attention towards a company is celebrity endorsement.
By endorsing a brand through a celebrity, a company can bring awareness among its
customers about its business (Laudon and Traver, 2016). This would may arise willingness
among them to purchase its products which directly lead to enhance sales performance and
revenues of a firm.
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Drawbacks of using celebrity endorsement:
It has been analysed by reading a blog on – Celebrity endorsement: what are the risks?
(2015) that apart from various benefits of using celebrity endorsement as a marketing tool, it may
arise various challenges and risks for a brand. For example- if a celebrity has high reputative
image among customers then their popularity might affect or overshadow the brand of a
company (Addo, 2016). If the commercial ads focus more on much promoting a celebrity, then it
may cut out brand recognition of a company in their customer’s minds. This may also lead to
arise problems for a firm if a celebrity is endorsing the number of products at the same time,
because customers might see them and associate with other brands and may influence their
purchasing behaviour negatively (Gong and et. al., 2017).
Along with this, it has been analysed through perception of Negi, Fern and Jeedigunta
(2018), that getting a celebrity endorsement a company typically requires a lot of finance or a
substantial chunk of funds. In this regard, to sign a bond or an endorsement contract with a
celebrity for more than ten years, a company has to invest a multi-billion dollars, which may
increase cost of a product and cut interest of certain customers, as they can’t afford to purchase
the same (Garg and et. al., 2017). Therefore, it affects higher profitability of them negatively.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Chen, H., 2018. College-aged young consumers' perceptions of social media marketing: The
story of Instagram. Journal of Current Issues & Research in Advertising. 39(1). pp.22-
36.
Laudon, K. C. and Traver, C. G., 2016. E-commerce: business, technology, society.
McCormick, K., 2016. Celebrity endorsements: Influence of a product-endorser match on
Millennials attitudes and purchase intentions. Journal of retailing and consumer
services. 32. pp.39-45.
Gong, S. and et. al., 2017. Tweeting as a marketing tool: A field experiment in the TV
industry. Journal of Marketing Research. 54(6). pp.833-850.
Addo, J. O., 2016. Moderating factors of celebrity endorsement on diffusion. Global Journal of
Management And Business Research.
Garg, R. and et. al., 2017. Driving Customer Appeal Through the Use of Emotional Branding.
IGI Global.
Negi, D., Fern, M. and Jeedigunta, R. N. V., 2018. Impact of Celebrity Endorsements and the
Prevalence of Vampire Effect-A Review. Academy of Marketing Studies Journal.
Online
Celebrity Branding Is Making A Comeback - Tips for Success. 2014. [Online] Available
Through: <https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinharrington/2014/08/18/celebrity-
branding-is-making-a-comeback-tips-for-success/#538c173365d0>.
5 Reasons Why celebrity endorsement works. 2016. [Online] Available
Through:<https://medium.com/strategic-content-marketing/5-reasons-why-celebrity-
endorsements-work-47de8515b072>.
The effectiveness of celebrity endorsements: a meta-analysis. 2017 [Online] Available
Through:< https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11747-016-0503-8>.
The Effect of celebrities in advertisement. 2019. [Online] Available Through:<
https://smallbusiness.chron.com/effect-celebrities-advertisements-56821.html>.
Impact of celebrity endorsement on brand. 2019. [Online] Available Through:<
https://www.scribd.com/document/7146790/Impact-of-Celebrity-Endorsements-on-
Overall-Brand>.
Celebrity endorsement: what are the risks?. 2015. [Online] Available Through:<
https://blog.optimy.com/celebrity-endorsement-what-are-the-risks/>.
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