Sports Celebrity Endorsement: Consumer Behavior and Brand Impact

Introduction and Research Questions

Marketing as a science and as an art form relies heavily upon impression building, an understanding of the psychology of one's consumers, and the ability to communicate a desired image with the aid of emotionally evocative cues. When an advertising agency constructs the print, radio, television, or internet item that will carry these characteristics, a great deal of thought and discussion will typically be invested in determining the intended presentation of the client. This discussion will touch on such matters as the visual response sought by the client; the verbal phraseology most likely to strike the difficult balance between compelling and safe; and the human subjects who will be used to endorse the product, service, or reputation of the client. To this latter point especially, there is a wealth of evidence suggesting that the people used to endorse products, services, or companies — whether professional actors, everyday individuals, or celebrity sponsors — will evoke a response in the intended target. This is a reality that is especially relevant in the world of professional sports, where sponsorship and endorsement are largely considered part of the job.

The purpose of the research conducted here is to determine to what extent the use of athletes impacts the impression invoked in intended consumers, whether this has an effect on buying habits, and if so, how this effect is manifested. Based on what is available in terms of research on the impact of sports celebrity endorsement on buying habits, it is argued here that a positive sports celebrity image can have a positive impact on the market performance of the associated product, service, or organization. It is also argued that endorsement by a sports figure who subsequently becomes entangled with a negative association — due to legal infraction, behavioral instability, or even performance decline — can have a negative impact on an organization's desired impression and, thus, on its market performance.

In order to address the topic with focus and precision, the research is guided by distinct questions concerning the correlation between sports figure endorsement and market behavior. The primary research question directing the research process is the following:

What is the impact, positive or negative, of sports celebrity endorsement, sponsorship, or advertising association with relation to the effectiveness at reaching an intended target, at influencing buying behavior according to a desired end, or at producing the desired relationship between image and brand?

This leads to a number of sub-questions that also guide the research process. Among them, the following are the most crucial:

How can the positive reputation of a sports figure impact the image of a product or organization? How can the negative reputation of a sports figure impact the image of a product or organization? Is there a direct correlation between the use of a sports celebrity and the sales performance of an associated product, line, or organization?

Methodology

There is a wealth of observable case history available for examination, but there remains a shortcoming in terms of concrete data concerning popular impressions of sports celebrity endorsement and individuals' direct tendencies of response to it. This means that there is both a considerable availability of sources from which to draw a thorough understanding of the impact of sports endorsement on market behavior and, simultaneously, a need to design an instrument for gathering data on individual responses and beliefs. As a result, the research is conducted in two separate methodological phases.

The first phase is a detailed investigative literature review. This considers a host of scholarly journals, published texts, online sources, and marketing reports on the subjects of sports advertising, celebrity endorsement, and impression management. The synthesis of findings from previous research endeavors is used to establish a fuller understanding of what we already know about the potential value and possible drawbacks of using sports figures to create impression, brand association, and consumer behavior. The sources consulted address the relative popularity of the approach, the illustrated benefits, the possible pitfalls, and the set of beliefs amongst advertisers and consumers that impact how this method of advertising is used.

The findings produced by the literature review are used to hone the set of questions best suited to construct a meaningful and effective survey instrument for gathering sample data. From a sample of 100 self-proclaimed sports fans — divided evenly between 50 male and 50 female subjects — the survey was distributed with the intent to gain an understanding of how sports fans view themselves in relation to celebrity sports endorsers and the buying habits related to associated products, services, or organizations. The sample was drawn from volunteers in attendance at an actual sporting event. As the bulk of this research was conducted in concert with the soccer season, volunteers were selected at a World Cup soccer game and administered the survey, which they could then return to an honor box located near the front gate of the stadium. The findings were then synthesized into a set of conclusions concerning consumer self-report on buying habits and personal response tendencies where sports celebrity product endorsement or sponsorship is concerned.

Literature Review: Celebrity Endorsement and Sports Marketing

A literature review on the subject addresses first and foremost the principles and available findings relating to celebrity endorsement in marketing as a general concept. This leads into various points of discussion relating to the perceived impact of utilizing an individual of popular recognition or appeal to establish some desired image or impression of a product, service, or organization. Generally speaking, this refers to the very familiar and commonly used appeal to figures of note from entertainment, public service, or other fields of performance to speak persuasively on behalf of a product or organization. The marketing approach is described in the research by Agrawal and Kamakura (1995) as being largely beneficial to the organization in question, provided that it has successfully chosen the appropriate individual to serve as a hired representative. As Agrawal and Kamakura note, the apparent effectiveness and value of this method of advertising leads many organizations to perceive it as a worthwhile expenditure. Indeed, as their article reports, "according to industry sources, approximately 20% of all television commercials feature a famous person, and approximately 10% of the dollars spent on television advertising are used in celebrity endorsement advertisements" (Agrawal & Kamakura, 56).

The frequency with which companies appeal to celebrities for marketing purposes reflects the view that there are distinct opportunities for the company to gain greater recognition, positive association, and brand image development. Where celebrity endorsement is concerned, there is a tendency on the part of the consumer to draw inferences about the nature of the company being advertised. Many of these inferences are drawn from a perception of the celebrity in question and are used to construct an emotional response to what is being sold. According to Agrawal and Kamakura, an existing body of research supports this pattern. They report that "findings show that celebrities make advertisements believable and enhance message recall. Furthermore, celebrities aid in the recognition of brand names, create a positive attitude towards the brand and create a distinct personality for the endorsed brand" (Agrawal & Kamakura, 56). Provided that advertisers have selected the proper celebrity to resonate with the selected target, the money invested in bringing a celebrity onboard can be rewarded with the exponentially beneficial outcome of an overall achievement of brand image.

This is proving especially true where sports celebrities, professional athletes, and others affiliated with professional sports are concerned. The natural marketing context and built-in audiences provided by sportscasts, regionally popular sports figures, or even nationally or globally recognized athletes function as a very attractive motive for companies and products that bear a relationship — peripheral or direct — to the world of sports. As the text by Wenner (1998) phrases it, "the common factors in these phenomena, beyond the construction of communities of sporting interests that transcend national boundaries, is that boundaries between what used to be related but separable activities — the promotion of sports, and the use of sports events and personalities to promote other products — are being dissolved" (Wenner, 57).

Wenner introduces the compelling idea that sports marketing is a process that has evolved as an inherent consequence of the professionalization and paying spectatorship of most major league sports. By virtue of the fact that sports such as baseball and football in the United States had begun to prove themselves enormously popular and profitable, the intrusion of sponsorship and advertisement as a regular element of the game had begun a century ago. However, the paired evolution of the sports market — expanding across an enormous breadth of market contexts and categories — and of the media channels through which sports are sold and broadcast resulted in a clear opportunity for integration of the sports and marketing sectors. As Wenner indicates, "the production and staging of sport as commercial entertainment led to the emergence of entrepreneurial structures and practices that would slowly transform the relationships between sporting teams and the communities they ostensibly 'represent'" (Wenner, 58).

Thus, the idea of associating stars of professional sports with products — or indeed commoditizing the players themselves — would become an early and important part of the evolution of the major and international leagues that constitute the highest level of athletic competition today. The appeal of individually stellar athletes would be directly tied to the expansion of mass media capable of reaching new levels of audience captivity, with respect both to the sports and to the advertising blocks that sponsored their broadcast. Wenner elaborates this point, indicating that in the early evolution of professional sports in America, "for those players who acquired reputations for producing the goods in decisive situations — whether home runs, goals, or touchdowns — their feats became legendary, and the men themselves were constructed as larger than life characters. Such attention has turned figures from Babe Ruth to Wayne Gretzky into household names, and along with similar 'star-marking' publicity in the film and music industries, it has helped create the phenomenon of the celebrity entertainer" (Wenner, 62).

This is a key point, offering the concept that individual players of note have the capacity to be viewed as stars transcending the games in which they have excelled. In addition to the symbolic appeal of a figure such as Michael Jordan, Muhammad Ali, Tiger Woods, or Babe Ruth, many of these individuals have commanded a powerful brand image with its own built-in market capability. With respect to the growth of their various sports and their capacity to influence buying behaviors, Wenner argues that "famous names were shown to promote interest in the sports events or films they were part of, and also to help sell the products they endorsed. Thus it was not long before the media and entertainment industries recognized their common stake in the manufacture of 'names' for a public demonstrably fascinated by stardom" (Wenner, 62).

This would produce the increasingly complex, demonstrably reliable, and occasionally regrettable affiliation between professional athletes and commercial endorsement of products and companies. As a result, sports marketing is today its own field within the broader subject of marketing. The concept is principally expansive and multifaceted. The surface notion of marketing logos, symbols, and products in merchandising association with teams, leagues, organizations, or individuals is supplemented by countless other branches of retail, public relations, and advertising that must be assessed under the umbrella of sports marketing. This discipline stretches across countries, athletic traditions, seasonal variations, and a diverse, multi-stratified range of targets, with contexts and media also varying widely.

Examples persist in everyday life: Michael Jordan's well-known associations with products external to the sporting industry, such as Hanes underwear and Nike sneakers; the banking industry's wholesale dominance in the contest to name modern stadium complexes; the specific tailoring of Budweiser commercials to appeal directly to audiences of NFL broadcasts; and even the direct sponsorship of performing athletes in individual-competitive sports such as NASCAR racing or Xtreme tournaments. This sweeping view of sports marketing is intended to demonstrate the vast array of branches contributing to an understanding of this as a rapidly growing industry with increasingly greater implications in mainstream contexts such as entertainment, health, consumer markets, and personal value systems. Wenner's text places the beginning of this phenomenon in the early twentieth century, observing that "by the late 1930s, it was possible to see in outline what would become the ubiquitous place of professional sport in North American popular culture. It is important to recognize that it was the development of newspaper chains and radio networks that became, in effect, national information systems that facilitated the development of common knowledge and interests among geographically dispersed regions" (Wenner, 62).

This points to the clear association between media innovations and the spread of interest in the sporting tradition which persists even today. The massive commercial potential suggested early by sports stardom is only further magnified in the age of 24/7 information and entertainment. Sports-specific cable packages, webcasts of athletic competitions, and mobile technology programmed to provide score updates and game highlights are all innovations which have carried significant commercial opportunities. Wenner argues "that the emergence of national media in America was driven by the interests of advertisers in reaching national audiences also meant that the lines between news, entertainment, and advertising would be constantly blurred. This would help to make the place of both professional sport and its sponsors in the fun-oriented consumer culture that was part of the promise of 'America' in the interwar period, and would become even more so after the war" (Wenner, 62).

This theme of a cultural proclivity toward consumerism and the permeation of sports into various aspects of everyday life is an important one in the present discussion. The American professional sporting tradition commands great power and presence in many aspects of American life. Personal attachments to leagues, teams, and individuals make sporting events a major part of the cultural and recreational experience. There is additionally the propensity for individuals to form personal athletic habits according to these attachments. Certain events — such as the NFL's Super Bowl, baseball's October Classic, or the NBA's All-Star Slam Dunk Competition — constitute important moments in collective memory and shared consciousness.

As a reciprocal reality, the best professional athletes are also among the most highly visible and highly paid members of society. For some individuals raised in settings ranging from comfortable to impoverished, professional sport has represented not just a leap into the top fraction of America's earners, but also a pass into high society, television and film appearances, and a limitless category of opportunities for endorsement and marketing work. This equation has produced a sports marketing industry that constitutes at least as broad a market as the professional sporting industry itself. With recent estimates evaluating the total sports marketing industry as accounting for $250 billion a year in the U.S. alone, it is clear that the sporting business is comprised of far more than ticket and concession sales (Wikipedia, 1). Thus, as we consider the present investigation concerning consumer behaviors, we do so with an understanding that the affiliation with professional athletes and sports icons offers the opportunity to engage marketing targets across a vast array of contexts through highly visible individuals.

Research identifies consistently that television is the most important medium in sports marketing. This is underscored by Mullin et al. (2007), who identify television's rise in popular penetration with the growth of the global sports entertainment market. Accordingly, Mullin et al. indicate that "television has helped to build fan bases ever since the 1950s. As much as anything else, the spread of television images has spurred global markets for certain sport products such as the NBA, Nike, and Michael Jordan" (Mullin et al., 9). Even today, with the increasing intercession of advancements in internet technology and innovations in the manner in which sports organizations attempt to reach their audience, television's unique audio/visual real-time feed is often seen as the best way to access one's sports teams and organizations. This, in turn, makes the medium particularly useful both for establishing sports stars as recognizable faces and household names, and for using these same stars to create a visual association with selected brands.

The argument made by Mullin et al. concerning the continued primacy of television is supported by additional research. A study co-sponsored by ESPN found that in 2001, 93% of youth ages eight to seventeen watched, listened to, or read about sports via television, radio, newspapers, books, the internet, video games, and movies. Television is the medium used most for sports by the majority of these youth — 93% of boys and 81% of girls (FS, 1).

This pattern began to emerge in the 1960s and 1970s, when the unprecedented popularity of such individual stars as the NBA's Wilt Chamberlain and Julius Erving, and Major League Baseball's Hank Aaron and Reggie Jackson, began to give rise to both the prominence of the sports agency and the cross-marketing sporting icon (Wikipedia, 1). The notion that the sports star was a ready-made figure for the endorsement of products of consumer interest had begun to emerge simultaneously with the notion that the sports star might begin to command a salary concordant with increasingly impressive box office and merchandising returns for sporting organizations. The prospects for the cultural and economic enormity of professional sports would reach a point of inflection with the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, "when corporate sponsors used the Games as a platform to market their brands. Coca-Cola, for example, spent nearly $30 million in support of its official sponsorship of the Games" (Wikipedia, 1). The 1984 Olympics would serve as a template for the increasingly enormous trajectory of sports marketing, with the gradual expansion of such televised events as the Super Bowl reaching exponential proportions.

Conclusion

The general thrust of the literature review suggests that there are determinable benefits to using sports celebrities for product endorsement purposes but that there are also inherent risks. Findings in this part of the research process indicate that by and large, there is a normalcy to the use of sports celebrities in selling products that are related to sports activity, peripherally affiliated with sports, and not affiliated with sports at all. This is to suggest that the approach taken by advertisers has been to act upon the impulse that there is a cultural permeation produced by the popularity and recognizable features of visible sports professionals that transcends even the interest level of their particular sport. To advertisers, there is a perception that the use of a sports celebrity whose personality appeal or performance excellence has endeared him or her to the public is sufficient to reap the benefits of endorsement. This is demonstrated in such aspects of the discussion as those which refer to Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods, whose enormity has demonstrated them to be effective brand images even beyond the popularity or limitations of their respective sports.

To the research here, this review induces the belief that sports celebrities will generally tend to reflect qualities that are either envied or admired by the general buying public. Where this is the case, product endorsement may result in certain psychological effects that may not necessarily distort the buyer's perception of his or her own likeness to the athlete in question, but will tend to promote an association of the positive qualities seen in the athlete with the product. Of course, as the review denotes, this can be something of a double-edged sword for advertisers, who must contend with the danger that an athlete has either been poorly selected for the specific product in question or that the athlete's reputation does not live up to the expenditure made by the advertiser. This may happen for a number of reasons, particularly owing to the athlete's public behavior or relationship to the buying public. In those frequent instances through recent history in which athletes have been accused of misdeeds, behaved in ways that have alienated the public, or have been convicted of crimes, the impact of having established an association to this athlete can be regarded as anything from a bad investment to a destructive blow to a company or product's image.

Typically, these negative effects can be absorbed by a company on the scale of McDonald's, Nike, or Coca-Cola — the host of major brands that use athletes with a high level of public familiarity. This suggests that the potential risk in investing in certain public personas is perhaps one best taken by those companies possessed of the financial resources to recuperate and, in eventuality, erase the public perception of a damaging image association. For those companies that in years past used the once-popular O.J. Simpson to endorse their products, the disgraced former football player would reflect negatively on image and judgment. Largely today, however, those effects have been erased by years of rehabilitative advertising distancing and eventually removing such associations.

This is a complex aspect of the issue which points to the findings of the survey used by researchers in this process. Namely, the survey functions as a supplement to the literature review findings which report on the experiences of advertisers. Taking the approach of surveying potential consumers on their feelings relating to the subject, findings differed slightly — at least insofar as they indicated a correlation between the image or behavior of an athlete and the effectiveness of his or her association to a specified product. The synthesized findings from the survey suggest first and foremost that there is a significant causative relationship between the athlete's performance quality and the likelihood of the buyer to purchase a sports product which he or she endorses.

The findings also allow us to conclude that this is because, most primarily, consumers trust the expertise of those athletes who have achieved a reliable degree of success within their field. There is also a demonstrated correlation between the degree to which an individual admires an athlete and the degree to which the individual desires to support the sport in which this athlete is a noted performer. These are findings which suggest to advertisers that there is a close connection between the athlete selected to represent the product and the degree to which this representation strikes a chord of credibility with potential buyers.

Other findings in the survey indicated moreover that consumers are wary of the reputations and behaviors of athletes, and that potential buyers could not preclude the possibility that behaviors demonstrated by the athlete might incline them not to make certain purchases. The survey phraseology indicated that respondents were unwilling to commit to the condition of making purchasing decisions fully independent of the athlete's behavior. This is a finding which should also be considered compelling to advertisers, indicating another area in which selectivity must be exercised in determining whether or not an athlete is a proper fit to one's product or company identity.

In concert with the literature review — which denotes a direct connection between the ability of a company to absorb risk based on size and resource availability — advertisers can conclude that this is an endorsement approach which must be entered into judiciously and selectively. The literature review and survey have together addressed a spectrum of implications concerning sports figure sponsorship, including: the broad economic realities related to sports marketing, such as the scale, scope, and consequence of its permeation into so many aspects of life; an evaluation of its relationship to shared social values such as the selection of role models, the ambition for competitive success, and an identification with either team or individual goal orientation; and the public health consequences — both positive and negative — concerning the proclivity of members of the public to identify with sporting figures and the goals related to achievement in sports.

Most importantly, the marketing principles which are emergent in this discussion carry great weight in terms of the relevance or appropriateness of sports celebrities as product or company endorsers. The sum accomplishment of the research conducted here is to promote a greater discretion and effectiveness for companies and advertisers making such decisions. The resolution induced by a pairing of the survey data and the findings of the literature review concerns not the effectiveness of sports celebrity endorsement — which is somewhat self-evident if done properly — but rather the recommendation that celebrity athletic endorsement be carefully selected and effectively used. Various marketing principles enter into the approach taken toward sports celebrity endorsement, primarily concerning the public image carried by an athlete, the uncertainty in the correlation between performance and image, and the danger of critically mismatching an athlete with a product, company, resource availability, or intended audience.

It is clear that there are fundamental benefits to the use of celebrity athletes in the endorsement of products and companies, though this is an investment with some intangible realities due for consideration. Therefore, an interest in this approach must be underscored by careful consideration, sensible selection, and a rational association of traditional marketing principles with an understanding of the complexities unique to sports marketing.

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