In for a penny, in for a pound? Exploring mutual endorsement effects between celebrity CEOs and corporate brands

Abstract

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation.*Related content and download information correct at time of download. Abstract Purpose -While the branding of individuals has attracted increasing attention from practitioners in recent decades, understanding of personal branding still remains limited, especially with regard to the branding of celebrity CEOs. To contribute to this debate, this paper aims to explore the cobranding of celebrity CEOs and corporate brands, integrating endorsement theory and the concept of meaning transfer at a level of brand attributes. Design/methodology/approach -A between-subjects true experimental design was chosen for each of the two empirical studies with a total of 268 participants, using mock newspaper articles about a succession scenario at the CEO level of different companies. The study is designed to analyse the meaning transfer from celebrity CEO to corporate brand and vice versa using 16 personality attributes.Findings -This study gives empirical support for meaning transfer effects at the brand attribute level in both the celebrity-CEO-to-corporate-brand and corporate-brand-to-celebrity-CEO direction, which confirms the applicability of the concept of brand endorsement to celebrity CEOs and the mutuality in co-branding models. Furthermore, a more detailed and expansive perspective on the definition of endorsement is provided as well as managerial guidance for building celebrity CEOs and corporate brands in consideration of meaning transfer effects. Originality/value -This study is one of only few analysing the phenomenon of meaning transfer between brands that focus on non-evaluative associations (i.e. personality attributes). It is unique in its scope, insofar as the partnering relationship between celebrity CEOs and corporate brands have not been analysed empirically from this perspective yet. It bridges the gap between application in practice and the academic foundations, and it contributes to a broader understanding and definition of celebrity endorsement.

Company versus consumer performance: does brand community identification foster brand loyalty and the consumer’s personal brand?

“…Before being extending to other categories, the self-marketing concept was originally adopted when dealing with celebrities (e.g. Lim and Lim 2016;Moulard et al 2015;Rein et al 2007;Kowalczyk and Pounders 2016), politicians, business managers (Schawbel 2009;Shepherd 2005;Scheidt et al 2018) and also non-profit organizations' leaders (Nolan 2015).…”

New challenges in brand management

“…Now consumers and companies do not see only products and services as brands, but many other entities are also approached as branded entities. Humans in the form of celebrities (Kowalczyk and Pounders, 2016), politicians (Guzmán et al, 2015;Bigi et al, 2016), artists (Kucharska and Mikołajczak, 2018), managers (Bendisch et al, 2013) and celebrity CEOs (Scheidt et al, 2018), athletes (Carlson and Donavan, 2013), bloggers (Delisle and Parmentier, 2016) or as simple individuals (Guzmán et al, 2015) see themselves and are seen by others as brands in their own right. Countries, regions and cities are also seen as brands (Rojas-Méndez, 2013) and they are very complex in their makeup and approach.…”

When brands use CEOs and employees as spokespersons

“…In this sense, our findings highlight how internal endorsement refers to the corporate brand more than the product or the brand (compared to celebrity endorsement), and thus, has the capacity to influence the corporate brand perception. Although recent research (Scheidt et al , 2018) showed that famous CEOs impact the corporate brand image, our research enriches knowledge about the influence of unfamiliar CEOs and employees. In this sense, the exploratory and inclusive perspective (famous CEO, unfamiliar CEO and employees) adopted in this research allows us to suggest that internal endorsement has the ability to speak for the company and nourish the corporate brand image.…”