Presentation given at the 1st International Consumer Brand Relationships Conference, www.consumer-brand-relationships.org Copyright by Jasmina Ilicic Cynthia M.Webster

1. Multiple Endorsements and
Consumer-Human Brand Attachment
Jasmina Ilicic and Cynthia M.Webster
Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia

2. Celebrity Endorsement
 Traditional Research
 Celebrity Characteristics
▪ Credibility (Hovland & Weiss 1951)
▪ Attractiveness (McGuire 1985)
▪ Match-up (Kamins & Gupta 1994; Till & Busler 1998)
▪ Attractiveness Match-up
▪ Attractive celebrity-attractiveness enhancing product (Kamins 1990)
 Recent Research
 Consumer-Celebrity connections
▪ Self-concept (Escalas & Bettman 2009)
▪ Attachment (Thomson, 2006)

3.  Relationships with celebrities (Thomson 2006)
 Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci 2000)
 Extent to which the object meets three fundamental human needs:
▪ Autonomy
▪ Relatedness
▪ Competence
 Attachment Theory (Bowlby 1980)
 Separation Distress
▪ indicator of the strength of attachment bonds (Berman & Sperling 1994)
 Strong Relationship Outcomes
 Satisfaction, Trust and Commitment (Fletcher, Simpson & Thomas 2000)
Consumer-Human Brand Attachment

4.  Overexposure potentially detrimental (Till 1998)
 Negative perceptions (Mowen & Brown 1981)

Perceived as less credible (Tripp, Jensen & Carlson 1994)
Multiple Product/Brand Endorsements

5.  H1: Positive evaluations, in terms of
 a) attitude towards the advertisement
 b) attitude towards the brand and
 c) purchase intention
are greater when celebrities endorse a single branded product as opposed
to endorsing multiple brands.
 H2: Positive evaluations, in terms of
 a) attitude towards the advertisement
 b) attitude towards the brand and
 c) purchase intention
are greater when strong human brand attachment is present compared to
weak attachment.

6.  Highly familiar
 Equal on attractiveness
 Product categories perceived as attractiveness-unrelated
 Human Brand and product category perceived as being
neither congruent nor incongruent
 Human brand not have previously endorsed any products
Control: Celebrity Characteristics

7.  Pretesting
 Pretest 1: Celebrity selection
▪ 25 Students
▪ Rove McManus and Eddie McGuire
▪ Highly familiar and equal attractiveness
▪ Differing levels of attachment
 Eddie- Weak attachment
 Rove- Strong attachment
▪ Both had not endorsed brands previously
 Pretest 2: Product and brand name selection
▪ 19 students
▪ Product categories - attractiveness-unrelated
▪ Products neither congruent nor incongruent
▪ Photographica camera, Marc pen, Gafae coffee
▪ Translation in non-English languages
Rove
Eddie

8.  2 x 2 Factorial Design
Single Endorsement Multiple Endorsements
Strong Attachment Celebrity 1 Celebrity 1
Hypothetical brand: 1 Hypothetical brands: 1, 2, 3
Weak Attachment Celebrity 2 Celebrity 2
Hypothetical brand: 1 Hypothetical brands: 1, 2, 3

9. Test Brand

10. Test Brand

11.  Significant, moderate positive relationships between:
 Aad and Ab
▪ Pearson’s r = .404, p<.01
 Aad and PI
▪ Pearson’s r = .485, p<.01
 Ab and PI
▪ Pearson’s r = .421, p<.01
 Series of regression analyses- Baron and Kenny (1986) used for Sobel
Test (Sobel 1982; Preacher and Leonardelli 2005).
 purchase intention is directly mediated via attitude towards the ad
and attitude towards the brand
▪ test statistic of 3.78 and significance at the 0.001 level.

12.  Strong Attachment
 More positive Aad and Ab
 Greater PI
Variable Mean
Weak
Mean
Strong
Attachment 2.1502 3.0022
Ad Attitude 2.4948 2.9867
Brand Attitude 2.9651 3.1413
Purchase Intention 3.0067 3.4082

13.  Aad, Ab and PI affected by Attachment not
Endorsement Situation
Dependent Variable Source
Sum of
Squares Df Mean Square F Sig.
Attitude towards the
Ad Photographica
Attachment 11.413 1 11.413 23.401 .000
Endorsement .898 1 .898 1.841 .177
Attach * Endorse .299 1 .299 .614 .434
Attitude towards the
Brand
Photographica
Attachment 1.418 1 1.418 6.269 .013
Endorsement .177 1 .177 .783 .377
Attach * Endorse .000 1 .000 .001 .977
Purchase Intention
for Photographica
Attachment 7.865 1 7.865 4.309 .039
Endorsement .019 1 .019 .010 .919
Attach * Endorse 7.789 1 7.789 4.267 .040

14.  Strong Attachment
 greater Aad and Ab in both single and multiple ES
Attachment
StrongWeak
3.1
3.0
2.9
2.8
2.7
2.6
2.5
2.4
2.3
Aad
Single
Endorsement
Multiple
Endorsements
Low
High
Attachment
StrongWeak
Ab
3.2
3.1
3.0
2.9
Single
Endorsement
Multiple
Endorsements
Low
High

15. Attachment
StrongWeak
PI
3.8
3.6
3.4
3.2
3.0
2.8
2.6
Single
Endorsement
Multiple
Endorsements
High
Low
 Strong Attachment
 PI greater in single ES
 Weak Attachment
 PI greater in multiple ES

16.  Practitioners
 Identifying appropriate and effective endorsers for their
brands
▪ Based on consumer-human brand attachment
 Future Research
 Purchase Intention requires further investigation
 Investigate genuine endorsement situations, using real
ads with real brands.

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