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Celebrity Endorsement Marketing

Presenting the Celebrity Job Generator, inspiration for marketers eyeing unique roles for A-Listers

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By Katie Deighton, Senior Reporter

November 21, 2017 | 5 min read

Mo Farah’s knighthood wasn’t the only big milestone in his life this month – Virgin Media announced it had appointed the athlete as ‘director of going the extra mile’, a job title so idiosyncratic and ambiguous it rivals Will.I.Am’s role as director of creative innovation at Intel.

Mo Farah for Virgin Media

Mo Farah – athlete, Olympian, Virgin Media's 'director of going the extra mile'

To celebrate this trend for handing out roles to brand ambassadors, The Drum presents the Celebrity Job Generator – a digital experience for marketers looking for inspiration in their hunt for a VIP with a unique job title.

At the press of a button, brands looking to hire a famous face in a bizarre position will be presented an inspirational suggestion. How about Phil Mickelson as your brand’s global content artisan? Or Geri Halliwell as your next editor-at-large of consumer happiness?

Click here to head to the Celebrity Job Generator

celebrity job generator

The trend for ‘hiring’ celebrities in lieu of naming them as brand ambassadors began when Lady Gaga was named a creative director by Polaroid at CES 2010. The deal sparked a then-unexpected series of tech brand’s appointing musicians as creative directors, which, considering the lack of real branding experience most artists have, struggled to come across as anything more than surface level PR stunts.

There was Alicia Keys for Blackberry (a 'troubled' partnership pockmarked with faux pas, according to Billboard), Will.I.Am for Intel and Gwen Stefani for HP. Jessica Alba, an actress since the age of 13, took up the mantle for the dearly departed Windows Phone. Outside of tech, there’s been Victoria Beckham for Range Rover, Justin Timberlake for Bud Light and Nick Cannon for Radio Shack.

Bacardi appears to dish out the strangest titles of them all – Swizz Beatz (Keys’ husband, incidentally) is its ‘global chief creative of culture’ and Jillionaire its ‘minister of rum’.

If this kind of ‘hire’ appears to be nothing more than a form of influencer marketing, why do brands persist with the strategy?

A report from Celebrity Intelligence purports that the rise of social talent and one-off celebrity campaigns (the latter in vogue to mitigate any PR or financial disasters a la Tiger Woods) has also created a trend for 'traditional celebrities to differentiate themselves and have more meaningful relationships with brands'. On the other side of the coin, Google has noted in a study that A-listers 'aren't simply appearing for money, they're often taking a stake in the business itself'.

"Celebrity brand associations can act as shorthand for a company’s values, both internally to align culture, and externally to communicate positioning to customers," said Andi Davids, senior strategist at The Partners. "Virgin states Mo Farah’s qualities as ‘dedication, determination and tenacity’ – traits they no doubt want to instill in their staff – but he’s also known for incredible speed, reinforcing the positioning of Virgin’s transport and high-speed internet offering to consumers.

"Brands can also leverage the loyalty of their faux-employee’s fan base, gaining instant publicity and rapport with customers who might consider switching from competing brands as a result of the partnership. Finally, appointing a brand ambassador in the form of an ‘honorary director’ is lot less expensive than developing a creative campaign.

Rebecca Moody, chief strategist and founder at brand intelligence consultancy Salt Of The Earth, added: "Celebrities sell, so it's little surprise they’ve now officially made it onto the Big Brand Board. Haven’t they actually always been beavering away behind the scenes on fresh herb ranges, special edition crisp flavours and revolutionary new current accounts? Peter Kay has only just recently demonstrated his direct line into Jonathan Warburton.

"Done well, the use of a celebrity is dynamite. And if, in the instance of Mo Farah, the relationship is put to longer-term, grown up brand development, rather than just gimmicky PR use, having a knight of the realm who goes ‘the extra mile’ to monitor our broadband speeds might turn out just as useful as an ex-footballer nicking our crisps. Let’s see."

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