Multiple Endorsements and Consumer-Human Brand Attachment

Jasmina Ilicic and Cynthia M. Webster

Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia

Celebrity Endorsement

Traditional Research Celebrity Characteristics

▪ Credibility (Hovland & Weiss 1951)▪ Attractiveness (McGuire 1985)▪ Match-up (Kamins & Gupta 1994; Till & Busler 1998)▪ Attractiveness Match-up

▪ Attractive celebrity-attractiveness enhancing product (Kamins 1990) Recent Research

Consumer-Celebrity connections▪ Self-concept (Escalas & Bettman 2009)▪ Attachment (Thomson, 2006)

Relationships with celebrities (Thomson 2006)

Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci 2000) Extent to which the object meets three fundamental human needs:

▪ Autonomy▪ Relatedness▪ Competence

Attachment Theory (Bowlby 1980) Separation Distress

▪ indicator of the strength of attachment bonds (Berman & Sperling 1994)

Strong Relationship Outcomes Satisfaction, Trust and Commitment (Fletcher, Simpson & Thomas 2000)

Consumer-Human Brand Attachment

Overexposure potentially detrimental (Till 1998)

Negative perceptions (Mowen & Brown 1981)

Perceived as less credible (Tripp, Jensen & Carlson 1994)

Multiple Product/Brand Endorsements

H1: Positive evaluations, in terms of a) attitude towards the advertisement

b) attitude towards the brand and

c) purchase intention

are greater when celebrities endorse a single branded product as opposed to endorsing multiple brands.

H2: Positive evaluations, in terms of a) attitude towards the advertisement

b) attitude towards the brand and

c) purchase intention

are greater when strong human brand attachment is present compared to weak attachment.

Highly familiar

Equal on attractiveness

Product categories perceived as attractiveness-unrelated

Human Brand and product category perceived as being neither congruent nor incongruent

Human brand not have previously endorsed any products

Control: Celebrity Characteristics

Pretesting

Pretest 1: Celebrity selection▪ 25 Students▪ Rove McManus and Eddie McGuire

▪ Highly familiar and equal attractiveness▪ Differing levels of attachment

Eddie- Weak attachment Rove- Strong attachment

▪ Both had not endorsed brands previously

Pretest 2: Product and brand name selection▪ 19 students▪ Product categories - attractiveness-unrelated▪ Products neither congruent nor incongruent▪ Photographica camera, Marc pen, Gafae coffee▪ Translation in non-English languages

Rove

Eddie

2 x 2 Factorial Design

Single Endorsement Multiple Endorsements

Strong Attachment Celebrity 1 Celebrity 1

Hypothetical brand: 1 Hypothetical brands: 1, 2, 3

Weak Attachment Celebrity 2 Celebrity 2

Hypothetical brand: 1 Hypothetical brands: 1, 2, 3

Test Brand

Test Brand

Significant, moderate positive relationships between: Aad and Ab

▪ Pearson’s r = .404, p<.01 Aad and PI

▪ Pearson’s r = .485, p<.01 Ab and PI

▪ Pearson’s r = .421, p<.01 Series of regression analyses- Baron and Kenny (1986) used for Sobel

Test (Sobel 1982; Preacher and Leonardelli 2005). purchase intention is directly mediated via attitude towards the ad

and attitude towards the brand ▪ test statistic of 3.78 and significance at the 0.001 level.

Strong Attachment More positive Aad and Ab

Greater PI

Variable Mean Weak

Mean Strong

Attachment 2.1502 3.0022

Ad Attitude 2.4948 2.9867

Brand Attitude 2.9651 3.1413

Purchase Intention 3.0067 3.4082

Aad, Ab and PI affected by Attachment not Endorsement Situation

Dependent Variable SourceSum of Squares Df Mean Square F Sig.

Attitude towards the Ad Photographica

Attachment 11.413 1 11.413 23.401 .000

Endorsement .898 1 .898 1.841 .177

Attach * Endorse .299 1 .299 .614 .434Attitude towards the Brand Photographica

Attachment 1.418 1 1.418 6.269 .013

Endorsement .177 1 .177 .783 .377

Attach * Endorse .000 1 .000 .001 .977

Purchase Intention for Photographica

Attachment 7.865 1 7.865 4.309 .039Endorsement .019 1 .019 .010 .919Attach * Endorse 7.789 1 7.789 4.267 .040

Strong Attachment greater Aad and Ab in both single and multiple ES

Attachment StrongWeak

3.1

3.0

2.9

2.8

2.7

2.6

2.5

2.4

2.3

Aa

d

Single Endorsement

Multiple Endorsements

Low

High

Attachment StrongWeak

Ab

3.2

3.1

3.0

2.9

Single Endorsement

Multiple Endorsements

Low

High

Attachment

StrongWeak

PI

3.8

3.6

3.4

3.2

3.0

2.8

2.6

Single Endorsement

Multiple Endorsements

High

Low

Strong Attachment PI greater in single ES

Weak Attachment PI greater in multiple ES

Practitioners Identifying appropriate and effective endorsers for their

brands▪ Based on consumer-human brand attachment

Future Research Purchase Intention requires further investigation Investigate genuine endorsement situations, using real

ads with real brands.

Bowlby, John (1980), Loss: Sadness and Depression, New York: Basic Books. Berman, W. H., Sperling, M. B., 1994. The Structure and Function of Adult Attachment. In Sperling, M. B.

Berman, W. H. (Eds), Attachment in Adults: Clinical and Developmental Perspectives, New York: Guilford Press, 3-28.

Fletcher, G. J. O., Simpson, J. A., Thomas, G. 2000. The Measurement of Perceived Relationship Quality Components: A Confirmatory Factor Analytic Approach. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. 26 (3), 340-54.

Hovland, C. I., Weiss, W., 1951. The Influence of Source Credibility on Communication Effectiveness. Public Opinion Quarterly 15 (4), 635-650.

Hovland, C. I., Janis, I. L., Kelley, H. H., 1953. Communication and Persuasion: Psychological Studies of Opinion Change, New Haven: Greenwood Publishing Group.

Kamins, M. A. 1990. An Investigation of the ‘Match-up Hypothesis’ in Celebrity Advertising: When beauty may be only skin deep. Journal of Advertising 19 (1), 4-13.

Kamins, M. A., Gupta, K. 1994. Congruence between Spokesperson and Product Type: A match-up hypothesis perspective. Psychology and Marketing 11 (1), 4-13.

Kelley, H. H. 1967. Attribution Theory in Social Psychology. In Levine, D. (Ed.), Nebraska Symposium on Motivation, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 192-238.

McGuire, W. J. 1985. Attitudes and Attitude Change. In Lindzey, G., Aronson, E. (Eds.) Handbook of Social Psychology Vol. 2, New York: Random House, 233-346.

Mowen, J. C., Brown, S. W. 1981. On Explaining and Predicting the Effectiveness of Celebrity Endorsers. Advances in Consumer Research 8, 437-441.

Ryan, R. M., Deci, E. L. 2000. Self-Determination Theory and the Facilitation of Intrinsic Motivation, Social Development, and Well-Being. American Psychologist 55 (1), 66-78.

Thomson, M., 2006. Human Brands: Investigating antecedents to consumers’ strong attachments to celebrities. Journal of Marketing 70 (July), 104-119.

Till, B. D., 1998. Using Celebrity Endorsers Effectively: Lessons from associative learning. Journal of Product and Brand Management 7 (5), 400-409.

Till, B. D., Busler, M. 1998. Matching Products with Endorsers: Attractiveness versus expertise. Journal of Consumer Marketing 15 (6), 576-586.

Tripp, C., Jensen, T. D., Carlson, L. 1994. The Effects of Multiple Product Endorsements by Celebrities on Consumers Attitudes and Intentions. Journal of Consumer Research 20 (March), 535-547.