Things to Consider Before Hiring a Spokesperson
 In the wake of the Tiger Woods scandal, the question of “is it worth it” when it comes to celebrity endorsement has again come center stage. We at The EGC Group are ready to explore the topic, and want to take the debate one step beyond, and look at these risks and rewards vs. those of hiring actors and creating fake personalities to endorse your brand.
When you hire a celebrity to represent your brand, your company is exposed to the potential backlash should that person’s star fade—both professionally and personally. Perhaps the most important question when hiring the celebrity to be the face of your brand is what they truly represent as it relates to your brand, and if you can survive any number of potential “casualties” to their image.
Let’s use Tiger as an example. When Nike hired him as an endorser, it was no doubt that the fact that he had a clean, wholesome image was a benefit—but it was likely more icing on the cake than anything else. At the end of the day, Nike wants Tiger to represent supreme athleticism, perseverance and dedication… which, whether you like what he did or not, you can’t deny Tiger still does represent. This enabled and justified Nike in making the bold decision to stand by him. Our guess—the red shirt Tiger will wear on Sunday at the Masters will, like all of his red Sunday tournament shirts, reap millions of dollars of sales for Nike. If he wins, Nike should see sales through the roof. If he fails miserably, Nike will suffer as they always do when Tiger underperforms on the greens—but little will have to do with the scandal in his personal life, because Nike is aligned with Tiger the athlete, not Tiger the guy.
Now, Gillette and Tiger are a different story. It was, we would guess, more than icing on the cake that Tiger had a wholesome image when Gillette hired him to be one of the faces of “the best a man can get.” This is a personal care product—and as his personal life turns into tabloid fodder, it’s understandable why Gillette would seek to minimize Tiger’s image in their marketing. Companies like Gillette, TAG Heuer and Accenture are all more aligned with Tiger the guy, the overall package, than just Tiger the athlete, which explains their decisions to minimize his image in the wake of his scandal. It will take time before non-sports-affiliated companies can feel comfortable using his likeness—if ever again.
The moral of the story? You never know what your endorser will do, so try to align yourself with their greatest asset that makes sense for your company, and have a disaster plan in place.
Not willing to take the risk? Then why not just create a fake endorser? Hire an actor and create a face for your brand. Apple did it, so it must be brilliant, right?
Maybe. But there are risks there, too. What happens when your actor gets somewhat famous on his own? Will Apple suffer if Justin Long does something to feed the tabloids? Or is he benign because The Mac Guy is a character? Is it okay if Justin Long prefers Dell? These are muddy waters; ones that we’re certain Apple and other companies who make up fake endorsers hope they don’t need to experience any time soon.
We recently had a chance to ponder the “fake endorser” question when we heard a radio commercial for a local company I’m familiar with. The spot was a testimonial, and one we’d actually heard from the company last year. What struck us between last year’s commercial and this year’s iteration was that the voice of the man singing his praises was different between the two! The company was trying to represent two different people as the voice of one story. It suddenly made us wonder—were they both actors? Was the first guy the REAL guy, and why was he replaced? It really just left a question as to if the story was real at all… which certainly, we can assume, was not the company’s intention.
The moral of this story—if you’re going to create a fake endorser, make it clear the endorser is a character. Don’t try to represent them as something they aren’t—you’ll just make the consumer wonder if they can trust you.
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