Chapter 1: The Modern World of Marketing

If the world were full of all wise men and all wise women; we would have never heard of a term called "Advertisement". And then good products would have found the right customers and grown to prosperity. Firms would have worked out a mathematical formula to sell and succeed. But the buying process isn't rational; and so is this world.

The society that we live in can not only be called secular or democratic, it should be more appropriately termed as over-communicated these days. There are around 130 television channels in India broadcasting over 3 million television commercials each year in India. The media-explosion can thus be easily demonstrated. More over, people forget 80% of the information in just 24 hours! Just imagine the plight of the marketer to make his brand shout over the deafening clutter of all the brands! Some where in the 80s, an Indian marketer found the solution, called as 'Celebrity Endorsement'. For a long time companies have used well- known public figures, movie stars and sports personalities to endorse their brands, a sit is widely believed that these celebrities help to build or reposition brands by extending their personality, character and popularity to the brands they endorse.

The modern world of marketing communication has become colorful and inundated with advertisements, and it is hard to get noticed. It is an uphill task for the designer of an advertising campaign to differentiate itself from others and attract viewers' attention. In this jet age, people tend to ignore all commercials and advertisements while flipping through the magazines and newspapers or viewing TV.

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But even then, the glamour of a celebrity seldom goes unnoticed. Thus, celebrity endorsement in advertisement and its impact on the overall brand is of great significance.

In this process, the companies hire celebrities from a particular field to feature in its advertisement campaigns. The promotional features and images of the product are matched with the celebrity image, which tends to persuade a consumer to fix up his choice from a plethora of brands. Although this sounds pretty simple, but the design of such campaigns and the subsequent success in achieving the desired result calls for an in-depth understanding of the product, the brand objective, choice of a celebrity, associating the celebrity with the brand, and a framework for measuring the effectiveness.

Now Brand endorsement has been covered widely in the branding literature. Brand Endorsement can be simply defined as a persuasive communications strategy used by companies to have their products and services represented by a spokesperson. This can be a paid, a value in kind or an unpaid activity. The main aim of product endorsement is to persuade consumers to buy a product/ service, to shape their perceptions toward it and position it more as a lifestyle product or service rather than solely on its application merits. It is also intended to shape or change perceptions of a particular brand, increase brand popularity and consumer mind share of the brand, strengthen brand recall, and highlight differentiation and its uniqueness.

Comprehensive research conducted in this field of marketing communications suggests that celebrity testimonials do increase advertisements readership. Through their extensive work in this area, many researchers have concluded that endorsement

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by celebrities has a positive effect on the overall branding and communication and perception.

Although no study has prove din quantitative terms, any direct relationship between celebrity endorsement and increase in sales, corporations world wide resort to celebrity endorsements to create a positive effect.

The concept of brand endorsements and their effect on brand building is derived from seminal research in the fields of psychology and sociology. The basic premise is quite simple. With so many products in the market place, it is almost impossible for any consumer to absorb all the information and process it, and then decipher the information and evaluate its credibility. In such a scenario, customers seek to simplify things by depending on cues or easy rules of thumb. These cues can either be intrinsic or extrinsic and can be communicated through any medium. These simple rules of thumb help customers to shift through the massive amount of information to make an informed judgment or develop perceptions about products in the market.

With ever increasing numbers of advertisements and newer ways of communications being devised, even these cues have become abundant. Thus, a brand endorsed by a celebrity seems to establish a connection with customers, as many relate to or aspire to emulate their personalities. A strong brand provides not only the basic functional benefits but also provides its customers with an identity, a personality to whom they can relate and who expresses their own beliefs and attitudes.

Using a celebrity to endorse a brand is one such channel for the brand to associate itself with the unique identity and personality of the celebrity. At another level, a celebrity endorsement also helps the brand to achieve a wider awareness and better

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recall. It is said that to maximize the returns on brand endorsement, companies must strive to arrive at a good match between the brand being endorsed and the endorser.

Companies can use celebrities in four different roles, namely as a testimonial, an endorser, an actor or a spokesman. In a testimonial, the celebrity endors

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