"Celebrity endorsements of high involvement brands evoke cognitive evaluations that can erode brand equity and affect celebrity credibility"
Abstract:
Celebrity endorsement is one of the most commonly used channels of brand communication which a celebrity acts as the brand's spokesperson and endorses the brand's claim and position by extending his/her personality, popularity, stature in the society or expertise in the field related to the brand that he/she is associated with. Celebrity endorsements have long been seen as one of the most preferred tools to build a firm's brand equity by advertisers. This strategy has largely been successful. In fact every possible brand that enjoys high equity amongst its target populace has used celebrities at least once to endorse their products or services. However, when it comes to studying the effects of celebrity endorsement, very little work has been done to understand whether celebrity endorsements can lead to brand erosion, especially in high involvement products/services. This work primarily focuses on this issue.
The overall picture that emerges reveals a positive relationship between celebrity endorsements and brand equity built through positive brand associations of the brand and the celebrity. This study furthers research in this domain by focusing primarily on the celebrity endorsement ? brand equity relationship as applicable to high involvement product brands. The study explores the dynamics of brand equity within the purview of consumer attitudes as dictated by cognitive / rational evaluations of products. This research paper is limited to the study of a very well known Indian celebrity, Amitabh Bachchan, who enjoys high Q scores (a measure of popularity) and his association with a high involveme ...