I have
tried to avoid this topic for quite some time now but with yet another
celebrity endorsement falling at Nike’s feet, I felt a need to pose a question
to all who read this. Does your view of a brand change when the epic and highly
publicized failure of athletes and celebrities come to light?
Now I
don’t particularly want to go into what Oscar Pistorius, Lance Armstrong,
Michael Phelps, and Tiger Woods (just to name a few) did because we all have
read and heard enough of this in the news. But I do want to get into the
underlying issue. How do we as people, as consumers put so much faith in
athletes or celebrities that a brand has placed on a throne for all to see and
admire, when in actuality there are just as human as the rest of us? They all have their own faults, weaknesses,
and pressures. But we like to view athletes and celebrities as more; as someone
to look up to, someone who can inspire us to be more than what we are and
someone who we want to be growing up as a kid.
We don’t want to know their faults or their failures. We only want to
hear about their triumphs and successes.
As we
grow up and with a lot of help from the new media, we become more enlightened
and educated to their negative behaviour, but it still doesn’t stop the
public’s idealization of these so called iconic figures that so many brands
have labelled, so many times. However, for those athletes and celebrities that
have overcome remarkable odds do have a profound impact on the lives of others
as they touch the hearts of millions. Shouldn’t we not hold them higher
standard? So when they fall from grace, their fall is that much higher.
The
phrase that I have found that best describes the celebrity spokesperson is “Borrowed
Equity”. When a celebrity wears a Product A or uses a Service B, maybe the
consumers will purchase it too. But as you can decipher from the term-borrowed
equity; it is just that--it is borrowed. For as long as they are successful,
impactful, and relevant, they will be able to influence consumers. When a
company and their marketing and advertising departments get together and decide
to attach themselves to a celebrity or athlete, they are in most cases now held
hostage by that person’s image because it is supposed to reflect the image of
that brand. It holds true when you think of Michael Jordan you think of Jordan,
Sidney Cosby-Reebok, Payton Manning-Papa John’s, “Mean” Joe Greene-Coke and
Lance Armstrong you think Live Strong.
All of these celebrity athletes and the brands that have attached
themselves to them all have the same characteristics, but you now when you read
that list your image towards one brand and athlete has changed dramatically.
It is
not because the view of that company/brand has change; it is solely based on
the actions of one and is now his/her image is being placed beside that brand.
How long it takes a brand to recover from the tarnished reputation of their
spokesperson is purely based of how iconic the figure was. Now you won’t see Tom
Brady endorsing beauty, but if he endorses a new Under Amour clothing line, you
may consider it. The goal for companies is to obtain maximum exposure and
celebrity endorsements are just that and the same goes for the celebrities. We
cannot forget the goal for both parties and it is to gain exposure and increase
sales. When these symbolic figure heads fall, we should not forget what they
are a symbol our expectation put forth by the brands that employ them
