While flipping some online articles a couple of days back, a news took me by surprise. "Sachin Tendulkar to sign a contract with Coca Cola India". And today, i was scrolling down to check updates on my FB page, when i saw an old Pepsi Commercial posted by my friend, starring Aamir Khan Mahima, and Aishwarya Rai, more importantly, Aamir.
(http://www.facebook.com/#!/video/video.php?v=494033128875&comments)
And the next thing that came to my mind was some of the MBA gyan given by my professors about Brand Personality, Effect of Brand Ambassadors on consumer decision making, Self Concept etc.
Lets play a game of word association. What will you connect Aamir with ? Coke or Pepsi?
And what about Sachin Tendulkar again? Pepsi or Coke?
I`m sure our answers match, and thats when I ask a question... Is it a right decision to choose the brand ambassadors which your competitors have been tagged with, for years?
Will this confuse the customers?
When such companies choose these star brand ambassadors, they choose them very carefully so that the product concept can speak for itself. And then slowly the customers start associating themselves to the product by means of these brand ambassadors. They start believing in the product, because they believe in the personality endorsing it.
A new face as a Brand Ambassador wouldn`t have mattered much, as compared to the face of one`s competition`s celebrity endorsement.
And then a new dilemma arises for everyone.
Customer`s Dilemma
Am i drinking Coke because Sachin is endorsing it? Or is it because i like it?
Marketer`s Dilemma
Should the product sell buy the virtue of what the product is, or by who endorses it ?
Switching to competitor`s endorser has its positives too.
For a marketer of Coke, i am virtually stealing the the huge Sachin -Loyal Pepsi fan base. And i dont care if customers confuse themselves as long as my sales are increasing!
On the flip side, why on earth would someone spend millions to first create a loyalty base and then give it away to its competition so easily?
Lets look at our big boom brand ambassadors too. Ideally ambassadors claim to choose a product they believe in. Again ... ideally!
Remember Aamir posting for Coke in visuals, for how safe it is. ( after the pesticide incident ).
Imagine Aamir signing up back with Pepsi after few years, Coke and Pepsi falling into another Ad-War and Aamir going on breaking punches on Coke! I wont count that out of the possibilities please!
Does a line need to be drawn? Or perhaps, Is there a place for such a line?
-Prashant
Good thought. And here's the thing - 6 months after an ambassador switches to a competitor brand, people forget about the older association. That's how consumers are. Human. But interestingly, do people SWITCH too? Personally speaking, given a choice between A & B, I remain with brand A because I've developed a LIKING towards it, irrespective of whether the ambassador is still with the brand or not. Perhaps I moved to Brand A because of the ambassador, but now I'm settled.
ReplyDeleteBut NEW consumers are always coming in. There are millions ready to experiment, try something new. Millions who don't have an opinion. And these are consumers who would be influenced the most.
For the ambassadors its a difficult situation as well - an association for them should not mean life long bonding. They should be ready to choose. Why they switch should be clear to the followers. If the followers see the switch as purely MONETARY, it will not be effective.