Celebrity brand endorsers or ordinary people. Inaccessible or accessible dream.
Over the last several years, besides the well-known strategy of celebrity endorsers to promote a product, some companies turned to ordinary people when advertising their brands. For instance, Unilever’s Dove “Real beauty” campaign and the more recent one of Philips – “Innovation that matters to you”. Using the latter one to better explain the concept, it is the people next door to be used as faces of the campaign, because they are close to you rephrasing “Innovation that matters to you”.
Let’s take the strategy of L’oreal which is using well-known celebrities to endorse its products. So, the company builds a dream that, for instance, can be that you can have similar to Doutzen Kroes looks if using its products. And that dream is accessible because the products the company sells are affordable. Luxury brands, on the contrary, keep the dream they have built around themselves as inaccessible. And that’s what makes them luxury. The most common things they make affordable, via brand extensions, are the perfumes. This allows consumers to access somehow the brand, interact with it and boost their dream for acquiring in the future the product that really epitomizes the luxury brand. Speaking of luxury brand endorsers, it can be Angelina Jolie next the Louis Vuitton travel accessories on the back cover of “The Economist” magazine.
Going back to the two strategies to speak to consumers, personally I think that Philips probably chose the non-celebrity faces, first because they want to communicate what personal benefits for the consumer the innovation gives (thus giving the feeling that the brand is closer to her/him) and second, it is the notion that people are not allured anymore by the image of celebrities (and more specifically there is too much advertising clutter with it).
Basically, these are two opposite strategies that can serve different needs and brands, but the decision which one to choose can be sometimes tricky. What do you think? Please comment and #share.
Chief Executive Officer - THE STYLE GATE Int.
9yThe cheaper is the product the better it is if advertised by a celebrity. It's useless to advertise a croco bag through Angelina Jolie as 98% of the people will consider both the bag and Angelina not accessible. If you advertise a lipstick or sunglasses through a celebrity, 98% of the public will think "wow, with a minimum spending, I will have a branded product which, in addition, might make me (feel) like the celebrity of my dreams". So, in order to answer your question, both straegies are correct: just have to be implemented under different scenarios. There are then products that revealed to be not that much "further pushed" when advertised by a celebrity: think Nadal advertising Gilette trimmer or a soccer player advertising a shampoo. For sure a lot of men will not buy a shaver just because it shaves your skin like Nadal's one! Another topic is the "gender" of the consumer target: generally all female purchase can be more "celebrity driven" then men's one!