How Celebrity Endorsement effects Consumer Behavior - Term Paper Example

?Ar How Celebrity Endorsement affects Consumer Behavior 01/05 There has been a lot of emphasis on celebrity endorsement by the advertisers today. A brief analysis of advertisements can prove the success of this technique for businesses. More and more emphasis has been placed on this technique by the marketers. This paper aims to analyze the success of this technique, in doing so, it critically analyzes the existing literature and reaches to the conclusion that celebrity endorsement helps in building trust of the consumers. The relationship between celebrity endorsement and consumer behaviors have also been proved by the literature and included as a part of this short research paper. There are a number of factors discussed in this paper which affect consumers’ behaviors including the culture they live in and the cultural background of the celebrity used in the advertisement. Celebrity Endorsement: How and Why Does it Affect Consumers Do celebrities play a role in changing consumers’ behaviors and purchasing habits? The question remains a major mystery for us but not for the advertisers who have been using celebrities as a tool to increase the sales of companies. Celebrity endorsement has a positive impact on the sales of businesses. It is not only a useful tool to attract young consumers but celebrity endorsement is equally effective on adult male and female counterparts. This paper aims to analyze how celebrity endorsement affects the different groups and provides a number of examples to support the claims made. Children desire to eat, use and wear what is being advertised in an attractive way on television, internet and videogames. They even try to get access to that stuff which their favorite movie or video game character or athlete consumes (Taylor 2005, p. 17). They also try to consume the most popular brands to show their prestige and high living standards. Media has the power of transforming the choices and attitudes of the whole society by merely portraying things in a manner they wish to. People believe in media and somehow take inspiration from the characters on TV, actors in movies, models in magazines, authors of magazines or anchors of Radio. An estimation reveals that on average, Americans probably watch television for 1550 hours, spend approximately 1160 hours in listening to radio programs and nearly 290 hours are spent in reading newspapers, magazines and blogs (Eastman, 2003). This level of interaction with media confirms the reliance of the audience on the information provided on these mediums. Celebrity endorsement is one of the major techniques used by marketers to improve the brand image. It has been observed during the research that people are more willing to pay for branded products. The image of brands is largely dependent on its publicity and popularity among the consumers. People make branded objects their choice to make a better social reputation and influence other counterparts of the society (Dhar 2007, pp. 72-78). Celebrity endorsement leads to capture this type of ‘reputation conscious’ people. Celebrity endorsement helps in making the brand name popular in public. People using the products of certain brands can then easily expose their financial stability and excellent choice (Krahmer 2006). A well-known and well-advertised product or service increases the chances of its success as there is a quality conscious group which is not much concerned about the prices but is more concerned to get a high quality and reputable service or product. The rest of people who use expensive brands are trying to participate in the battle of today’s capitalist society. Whichever group is being targeted, celebrity endorsement is a tool of capturing the attention of the consumers and which successfully builds the brand name. Brand names attract people and increase the consumption of such products which are high regarded in a particular region, culture or society. Hence we may say that advertisements involving celebrities are somehow important to build brand names and increased consumption of distinct brands. The involvement of celebrity in an advertisement does not really mean that the product is credible. To make the advertisements attractive and eye-catching the advertisers use various techniques to capture the targeted group. For instance, if the targeted group is children, the advertisers use colors, toys, animated characters, athletes, movie celebrities, young models and other symbols that are of particular interest to children. Similarly if the product is some diet tablet for women, the advertisers involve slim, good looking and well-dressed athletes or actresses to show how their product works and helps women. However, if we consider the truth behind these advertisements, the advertisers overstate the reality. They portray such results that touch the boundary of deception in their portrayal. It may not be too wrong to say that advertisers are actually deceiving the public. Still, the trust of people on celebrities, media and the way products and services are portrayed motivate them to use or try the product or service. Culture has an important link with the consumer behavior and it is because of this factor of culture that many consumers buy products from a particular brand or company. There is a strong relationship between the consumer behaviors to that of cultural dimensions (Mooij 2009 p. 49). Celebrity endorsement helps in gaining consumer trust of a particular culture if the advertisement contains the image of a well known or popular personality of a particular culture. For instance, if the target audience of a product is Muslim population in any region of the world, a leading Muslim celebrity would grab the attention of Muslims more quickly than any other celebrity belonging to any other religion or culture. Consumer Behavior and Celebrity Endorsement are directly related to each other. Celebrity Endorsement can directly affect the consumer behavior and can affect it in such a way that the consumer may buy the product or may not buy it because of the bad advertisement about the celebrity. As the above critical analysis of the issue tells that consumer behavior is determined by several factors and celebrity endorsement is one of those factors. Celebrity Endorsement would lead to the involvement of celebrities in ads and if the product matches their personality and name the consumers would be forced to change their behavior towards the product and would be forced to buy it. Celebrity Endorsement thus has a direct effect on that of the consumer behavior and it is a strong determinant of it. However, on the other hand, if the celebrity receives bad publicity or is not perfect for the advertisement of the product then the consumer behavior might change and the consumers would possibly not like to buy the product. Thus celebrity endorsement has to be in line with the norms so that the consumer behavior is changed in such a way that the company benefits. Bibliography Taylor, J. (2005). Your children are under attack: How popular culture is destroying your kids' values, and how you can protect them. Naperville, Ill: Sourcebooks. Eastman, W. (June 06, 2003). Beginnings and Beyond: The Relationship between Television Violence and Neurodevelopment of Young Children. Canadian Children,28, 1, 16-20. Dhar, M. (2007). Brand management 101: 101 lessons from real-world marketing. Singapore: Wiley (Asia. Krahmer, D. (January 01, 2006). Advertising and Conspicuous Consumption. Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics : Jite = Zeitschrift Fu?r Die Gesamte Staatswissenschaft, 162, 4, 661. Mooij, M. . (2009). Global marketing and advertising: Understanding cultural paradoxes. Thousand Oaks, CA [etc.: SAGE. Top of Form Read More