Why celebrity endorsement is not always a good idea! | Bobby Pawar and Subhash Kamath [#13]

I don't think the difference between 85 and 95 and 90 people only can switch it between zero and 100. At the top, there's only room for 100. I believe in India 80% of celebrity usage and advertising that I see is not thought. Creating is easy. What to create is a million dollar question. Hi, you're listening to Marketing with Bani in which I speak to Marketing gurus. Together we decode how Marketing works in the real world to grow your business. Every week we read about a well funded start-up signing up a celebrity. To offer it feels like a statement of look I've arrived. Perhaps that's because we've grown up seeing the poaks and the Pepsi's of the world making a big splash with the biggest names. But signing up a celebrity is hardly the solution. Do we understand what it takes to make a celebrity work for your brand? What if people remember the film? Virat Kohli Kanya had I had I had only seen how much it started. But they don't recall your brand. Listen on to some of the biggest names in the industry who've spent a lifetime building brands with celebrities and know what it takes to make the partnership work. And why so often the big bucks spent on celebrities could in fact do more damage than help? Sir Bobby Pavar, Chairman and Chief Creative Officer of Havas India, which is one of the world's largest advertising agencies. Do you feel all of us Indians in general do you feel that now there is lesser star fitness for celebs as there was in the past are making a very big blanket statement? I think you know to a certain degree I think the accessibility of the stars is increased thanks to social media. But you know ask human beings with anyone in the world right even in LA that has been then the shooting and stuff like that. But let's the people are struck because everybody needs somebody to look up to. And so that's going to be there and it doesn't wax and win. The thing about celebrity endorsements is that nothing is a chainsaw right and it can cut free down pretty quick. But if you put the chainsaw in the hands of a monkey, chance will not the monkey is going to get hurt. And you're saying that celebrity endorsement is like a chainsaw is that what you're saying? Yeah, it's just how you wield it and who wields it right a lot of times we would say you know celebrity standards and say some good things about my product. That ain't what it was because everybody's doing the same thing right. I mean we couldn't I couldn't done the same thing when you know I did the make my trip campaign with the Ranbir Analia. I said I think that just being them is not going to help you need an idea as we need to make like because that's hard sell well how do I make it entertaining right. So that the hard sell comes through it's easily interesting. Hard sell works really well when you can make people laugh right. So this is not Ranbir Analia this is a bunch of characters right. Who will be inhabited by Ranbir Analia and we'll throw them in the most incredible situations. Very nice. So what you're saying is that the celebrity's work best when they're actually playing a character that suits the brand rather than playing the celebrities you know that they themselves are. They're not they're not playing Aliya's Aliya herself is she's playing a character that suits the brand. Absolutely and the thing is again is what is it that you're trying to do don't expect that okay this guy's going to come in and sell and that's going to work because that same guy or same woman right is doing it for 15 other brands. Yes. Right. So how do you disrupt the 15 other brands that they're doing it for. Correct. Correct. And when she's doing it for 15 other brands I don't think of this going back to our earlier discussion as the new Aliya ad then have you seen the new Aliya ad it's damn entertaining man what is she saying. Exactly. Exactly. So where. You know how what's your idea right is the idea central to the product or the celebrity yeah it's just a lot of people do celebrity endorsement in the absence of an idea thinking the celebrity will make up for it. That don't work right. I mean Nike does select has been doing celebrity endorsement from the get go from the time they use the car Lewis and all that right. But dude that's not a car. That's a freaking Nike ad right exactly. All the classic Nike Michael Jordan when Jordan is leaving me with that basketball and you just see one image. Yes it's Michael Jordan but for God's sake that's Nike and it just has that swoosh the Nike swoosh across it and it brings a life for me. All that Nike stands for it's it's inspirational it's larger than life it's reaching for goals that are beyond your reach. It's it's so many other things which are it is all of Michael Jordan yes and yet it's all Nike. So it is that aspect of Michael Jordan that is works parallely with Nike right. They both like there's a very famous I think one of my best Nike piece of communication is. Michael Jordan told me the camera and saying you know people think I'm like this incredibly successful guy but I'm not you know. I was cut from my high school team when I joined college there was the this thing the coach played me put me on the bench right I missed so many shots I missed so many game winners. I've fulfilled time and time and time and time again and that's why I succeed. Fantastic. And then just do it comes after that I mean what more do you want exactly that's beautiful that's beautiful. And then you don't I mean yeah I mean this comes from a really well written brand book right because this tells me. Absolutely. Here Subhash Kammat Chief Executive Officer BBH and Publisher's Worldwide India and Chairman Askeh from all of your long years in advertising are the examples that you can remember where the brand celeb marriage worked really well. And you felt that this liberty first of all was really you know was just right for the brand but not just that that it went like a really smooth relationship and you felt it couldn't have been better. There are quite a few there are quite a few examples that come to mind. First of all I just want to say that I believe in India 80% of celebrity usage in advertising that I see is not thought through. And you're talking about advertising in general or advertising with celebrities. 80% 80% 80% yeah 80% simply because a lot of marketers I believe have been very lazy about signing on celebrities. It's almost like you don't have a proper strategy yourself so let's get in a celebrity and buy something. I believe that's a short term tactical and a very expensive proposition to do. So imagine a category. Imagine a category where there are four brands one guy has got red collie the other guy has got a Charuk Khan the third guy has got mindless in Tony the fourth guy has got Salman Khan. There is no differentiation apart from my celebrities because I'm yours. 80% of the cases that I see and I keep telling clients this do not go spend crores of money some of these celebrities charge and crores. Don't just put that money behind a celebrity because I personally is famous. You first of all see there are two ways to do it one is I borrow fame from a celebrity who's a brand in itself or herself. The second is and borrow fame because I don't have a strong brand idea so I borrow fame to make my brand famous. The second is you create a very strong brand idea and then look for which celebrity can take make that brand idea more famous. These are two very easy way out. It's like we are advertising. So let's take a celebrity and make it famous. I mean, the idea may not be a big celebrity but if it's a celebrity then everyone will be famous. But the better way to use it is think of your celebrity as a brand in itself or herself. What values of that brand works well with your brand. First of all, you must have a strong brand idea in itself. If your brand idea is not strong then no matter which celebrity you come it's not going to impact. Now broadly these are the two buckets under which advertising falls. The lazy one I believe is 80% of celebrity advertising. Maybe 20% is well thought through and they are strong brands regardless if the celebrity stays with the brand next year or not. The brand still becomes remains the hero. The second area is how you use a celebrity. If I am creating a script only to play up the celebrity status and not making my brand the hero. What will happen is the celebrity will get more famous because it's only famous. And you paid another six crores, seven crores to make that person even more famous. And the worst thing that can happen is that if the consumer doesn't recall the brand but says, "Oh, Shahrukh, what brand is this?" Oh God, what a killer! A very successful brand like Nike for example. Which is one of the most powerful brands built over the years in sporting excellence. Nike has always used celebrities in many ways. Michael Jordan promoted air. They used, if I'm not mistaken, Tiger Woods at one point of the time. They've used Andrea Garcia, they've used footballers. They've used so many so many different athletes over the years. But the Nike brand, the core idea of Nike about excellence in performance and sports has always remained the center and the hero. And there is a whole Nike attitude. So every script that I've seen has brought about that Nike's brand attitude. So no matter how big a hero I use, my brand will always be the hero. And that's brilliant use of celebrities I would say. Even Pepsi in the past has used big time celebrities like Michael Jackson and so on and so forth. But that choice of a new generation has always been at the center of what Pepsi has stood for. Absolutely, the idea of Pepsi was always more than the celebrity. Exactly, but I'm just celebrities that we use with symbols of what Pepsi stood for. Correct. That was the beauty of it. So if Michael Jackson was at that point of time, the choice of a new generation will use Michael Jackson. Next year, if it is Rihanna, I will use Rihanna, that doesn't matter. Whoever is the choice of a new generation and Pepsi is always consistently positioned itself as the choice of the youth. That's right. Versus Coke was stood for a different word. So those are amazing examples. In India, for example, if you remember Thandamatla Kukakola, the campaign, which was Amir Khan. I thought that was absolutely brilliant usage because nobody will forget Coca-Cola in the series. You bet. Coke was right at the center of the story. And the best part is the best part is and this is something that is like a test for me. It takes the celebrity out. The script still holds. So they used Amir Khan for his acting abilities to play different characters that spoke about Coke. So they used him correctly. What is Tardam only? Not just because he was a big star. Absolutely right. And I believe that's the strategic understanding that agencies have to bring. Unfortunately, what has happened is a lot of these celebrity deals are being done directly with the celebrity agents and the clients. And the client, often the agency is called in to say, we've signed on so and so. You've signed on Amir Khan's budget or you've signed on Salman Khan's budget. Now we are all called Bacchaya. No, these are just names I'm showing not as passing in judgment. I'm just saying the deal has already been done. Now agency you figure out the strategy and the ad. And many a times it can backfire on you would have spent that kind of money. You know, you may have got some short term theme, but you haven't really beat a brand. I worked on Lakmi for many many years. And one of the key things in Lakmi in those days when Anil Chopra was handling it. And from the agency side, LC and all that. They discovered celebrities. People became celebrities after coming into Lakmi. So for example, nobody knew Ashwarya till she became Miss World. But Lakmi and I already done two campaigns with her as the face of Lakmi even before she became Miss World. Of course, after becoming Miss World she became globally famous. But for example, Lisa Ray or Yalagutta, all these people became well known through Lakmi advertising. Why? Because they were very clear what Lakmi is put for, what kind of a woman we want, what kind of an image we want to portray, what is our brand's personality. Then you choose which celebrity can fit into that. That is one strategic point. Or for example, you would be convinced that my brand has got a lot of positives going for it. But we are lacking in a couple of areas. For example, youthfulness. Let's say my brand is being seen as a bit too much of my father's generation brand. Lot of trust, lot of this thing. But, nae is a manekilogong ke saatutna connection neyar hai. I need to bring in some level of youthfulness into my brand. Then you can choose younger celebrities to make your brand more, bring in more absentee values, as I call it. As long as one is saying, you strategically think it through. First, about for your brand, what is the best thing? Then bring in a celebrity to push it. Another intelligent example I can remember was when Hyundai came into country for the first time. It was a Korean brand. It had no awareness in our country. Nobody had heard of Hyundai. So they needed to make themselves well known. But in what context? Look at the brilliance of that communication. If I am not mistaken, it was Sachi and Sachi, we have done it. I think everybody remembers that initial communication. It was so brilliant. And what was that? The entire communication was about these executives from Hyundai Korea trying to convince Shahrukh to take on their assignment. And Shahrukh is acting saying that I don't know you guys. I have never heard of you guys. Why should I? About for your car. And the entire communication was how to convince him about the beauty of a car. So they make him drive it. They make him experience it. And then he says, "Hey man, it's not bad, it's pretty good." So there was a. You know, it came across as cheeky but very nice. I hope you liked my show. And if you did, please do consider subscribing. I also have a YouTube channel by the same name, marketing by Vani. Please do check that out too. Thank you. [Music] How badly can she screw up? One nine. [Laughter] Okay. So I did screw up. My YouTube channel is called Marketing with Vani. The same name as this podcast. [Music]