Tiger Woods has everyone talking about celebrity endorsements and how they can have a negative effect on your brand. But there’s a reason why athletes and movie stars have been pitching products for the past 100 years.
It works. Transferring a celebrity’s equity onto your brands is a very efficient and powerful way to de-commoditize what you’re selling. You just have to follow some simple and time-tested rules.
MEASURE THE RELATIVE Q SCORE
It’s essential to establish your product’s awareness and social status so that you can hook up with a cultural icon who exceeds your level. You want to feed off their equity — not the other way around. Parity products, especially, benefit from this boost. Think Shaq and Radio Shack, for example. He brought way more status to the partnership than Radio Shack did, and he transferred that notoriety to the brand.
MEASURE THE MUTUAL RELEVANCE
How many times have you seen a sponsorship that makes no sense for the brand? That’s usually a sign that the brand is eager to steal the celebrity’s cultural relevance without regard to the brand’s own status. Back to Shaq and Radio Shack: There was nothing in the brand DNA that remotely connected Radio Shack to Shaquille O’Neal. And we found it hard to believe that the billionaire basketball star was buying his electronics gear at Radio Shack. (I can only hope that the strategy for the partnership reached beyond the Shaq/Shack thing.)
GAUGE YOUR RISK TOLERANCE
Everybody has secrets. It’s just a matter of what, and how many. So you have to embrace the level of risk your brand — and your parent company — is willing to tolerate. Two years ago I partnered a squeaky clean, adorable and happily married country singer with a squeaky clean pharmaceutical company, a match that seemed ideal, especially since she already used the client’s product. Then she was photographed in a motel parking lot with her married co-star and divorced her husband. Good thing we had an exit strategy.
HAVE AN EXIT STRATEGY
Look at it this way: Your product is dating the celebrity for a while. You’re not moving in. And you’re definitely not getting married. So just as you strategize the launch of your partnership, you should also plan how you’re breaking it up, even if it happens prematurely.
The best exit strategy is a quiet transition to another campaign idea, without fanfare, and without telling the media. Campaigns don’t last forever, and neither should your celebrity partnership.
Pepsi mastered the “rented equity” approach years ago, jumping on and off of Britney Spears, Beyonce, Madonna and dozens of others, feeding off their equity until the stars’ power overshadowed the soft drink. Then it simply moved on to the next big thing.
When Michael Phelps got caught bonging last summer, there was the usual media frenzy. One of his sponsors, a family brand, dropped him, citing his inappropriate behavior as inconsistent with the brand’s image. But the next day, another national sponsor signed him up. That brand felt its young target wouldn’t be fazed by the 14-time-Gold-Medalist’s mistake. And now, a year later, nobody cares.
The Tiger saga got a big, very public reaction. Some marketers severed their ties, earning themselves unnecessary scrutiny and media coverage, while the smarter brands ignored the headlines, held their ground and instead evaluated his absence from the golf tour. Because without the weekend trophy-hunting exposure, Tiger’s equity all but disappears.
That’s a reason to move on. Not the fleeting frenzy.
WHY CELEBRITY ENDORSEMENTS MAKE SENSE
Tom Hansen ([email protected]) is managing director, Rivet Chicago.
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