Brand, in the view point of manufacturer or service provider, is a feature that distinguishes the product or service in a market. A user may define brand as the one which he can recognize and identify as an integral part of his life. In this age of modernization and industrialization, consumer has emerged as the uncrowned king. He is the monarch of all he surveys. And to attract his attention, organizations are ready to innovate and upgrade. The 4P basic idea of Product, Pricing, Promotion and Place has come to evolve mostly around Promotion, as market survey indicates consumer likes to buy a brand, not a product or service.
And to showcase promotion, companies are making a beeline for the most saleable of products, that is, the Hollywood stars. Some say you can even sell dreams in Hollywood. So it is but natural that when the celebrities, who are the stuff of our dreams, wave to us from the silver screen or stare at us from flashy bill boards endorsing a product, we simply can not ignore the plea. After all, even for a flitting second, the user will feel that he is sharing something with his favorite idol.
Brand promotion by a Hollywood star enhances the longevity of the product, adding to its quality and mass appeal. The conveyed image of a successful individual using the product creates a sense of demand and urgency to get hold of it by the consumer. Better still, he begins to identify the product with the star, thus adding immensely to its recall value.
A user only sees a product when it is seen and this observation is triggered by various external factors and internal conditions. Perception of familiarity, trust and contentment are foremost conditions that influence the choice of a particular brand over another. Since the flashy world of entertainment and razzmatazz have easy recall value, the faces we adore and the style we follow compel a consumer to select that particular brand from the bouquet of choicest of products existing in the market. Market analysts have even noticed the trend of shift of consumers from one product to another once their favorite star leaves one company and starts to endorse another.
As Hollywood spawns the magic over almost the entire world, enticing the young and old, the poor and rich by its continued tales of fantasies and glory, emotions and intricacies, fervent admirers of the stars follow the fashion and style with bated breath. To some of them, turning down the plea of a star to use his product is akin to sacrilege. It gives a sense of vicarious pleasure to the consumer and awards him a sense of supremacy over his idol, as he feels that he is doing a favor by adopting the product promoted by the star. As the company and the star laugh together all the way to the bank, the consumer is left clutching with his straw of imagination that has been so well played upon by the promotional blitz of a brand by a Hollywood star.