Celebrity endorsement or celebrity branding is a well-known marketing strategy . It's used to promote a brand through collaboration with famous musicians, actors, sport's celebrities. In other words, world-recognized personalities or celebrities. This strategy has been working well for decades.

The first examples of celebrity endorsement appear around 1950. The big brands of the moment partnered with movie directors, actresses, and models. For instance, the alliance between Alfred Hitchock and Western Union and  Woody Allen with Smirnoff in to promote those products.

 Image from: Pinterest

Advertising changes as fast as media, with any new technological advance there’s a new sales tactic invented. Celebrity advertising adapted itself when the TV came out. Celebrities weren’t limited to printed paper anymore, they could now interact with the product and promote their brand. This phenomenon was a breakthrough in the advertising’ industry.

During the decade of the 80s Michael Jordan, came up with one of the greatest deals in the advertising industry. He got paid $2.5 million dollars for wearing and promoting Nike’s new pair of shoes. Since then, every single outstanding brand in the world has implemented celebrity endorsement as a marketing and sales strategy. For example, MBA, Adidas, Coca-Cola, Converse...the list goes on and on.

Does Celebrity Endorsement Work?

Yes, It’s a huge fact, the main goal of any brand is to sell their products. Brand awareness is valuable but what we ultimately want is to ensure the target buys our product.

Celebrity endorsement works perfectly because it does translate into sales. Firstly, celebrities -or influencers- already got our attention, they have certain values and attributes related to them. Secondly, the target audience will automatically match with the product. Thirdly, and most importantly, celebrity branding is going to increase your sales and expand your brand awareness. Also, people will associate the brand to your celebrity which will increase consumers’ loyalty and confidence.

Influencer Marketing VS Celebrity Endorsement

Influencer marketing and celebrity endorsement could get confused. While they are similar in some aspects they differ in key points. We could say that celebrity branding is the father of influencer marketing. Early in the advertising history, there were no influencers, only celebrities, until now. Thanks to social media we have micro, small, local, and big influencers. These influencers open great possibilities for brands to narrow down their targets and work with a small budget.

Another great difference of influencer marketing vs celebrity endorsement is working with influencers allows the brand to work more intimately and locally with their target, whereas celebrity branding ensures a global massive reach out. Influencers’ work is mostly limited to social media, creating word-of-mouth advertising, while celebrities adapt the brand to their values.

Whether your brand should work with influencers or celebrities depends on:

• Your brand’s message
• The best channel to communicate your message
• Your target
• Your desire reach 
• The product or service to promote
• The values you want to identify the product/service with
• Your budget 

Recent Celebrity Endorsement Cases in Social Media

Certainly, there are thousands of examples of celebrity endorsement. It was difficult to come up with only a few, but here are Stargazer Top 5 recent celebrity branding cases.

Jennifer Lopez

Advertising Media: Instagram
Followers: 114million
Promoted Brand: Portal From Facebook
Embed the video https://zoom.us/j/723338232

Rihanna

Advertising Media: Twitter
Followers: 95.7million
Promoted Brand: Sephora
Embed the image  https://twitter.com/rihanna/status/1203178935355265025

Cristiano Ronaldo

Advertising Media: Twitter
Followers: 82.7million
Promoted Brand: Nike
Embed the image https://twitter.com/Cristiano/status/1230830634639273984

David Beckham

Advertising Media: Instagram
Followers: 61.1million
Promoted Brand: Adidas
Embed the video https://www.instagram.com/p/B7lFw6EBgsH/

Ariana Grande

Advertising Media: Instagram
Followers: 175million
Promoted Brand: Ulta Beauty
Embed the image https://www.instagram.com/p/B5_UchmlbB3/

Celebrity endorsement does work. There’s a reason why it has been one main branding and marketing strategy for more than 50 years; evidently, the association of  your brand with your celebrity physical attractiveness, expertise, credibility, and values will increase your consumers and sales. A study made by the Journal of Advertising and Research shows how celebrity endorsement works not only increasing sales by 4% but also raising the company’s stock value.

Summing up, Celebrity endorsement is a terrific marketing strategy, guaranteed. Start now, contact Stargazer to make your brand famous!