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ENC2135
Boudreaux
17 February 2017
Over the Past Five Years, how has the Introduction of Celebrity Endorsements to
Some of the most influential people in America are famous celebrities; whether
they are politicians, actors, or religious leaders, they all have some impact on the lives of
those who idolize them. Since marketing companies are aware of this, it is no surprise
that they have turned to celebrities to endorse their products. Since the late 1700s, people
have been using this tactic to attract the public to a product that they are selling. Of
course the field of marketing and advertisement took off when television and, later, the
Internet were introduced. In the present day, however, companies have taken their
advertisements to social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, and most recently,
Instagram. Using statistics and data from a variety of academic journals as well as
information from newspapers and blog sites, the following question can be answered:
Over the past five years, how has the introduction of celebrity endorsements to Instagram
and Ignatius J. Horstmann, claim that although the use of celebrity endorsements began
over 100 years ago, it really took off when companies began using professional athletes
in the 1930s. According to Horstmann and Clarks article, by 2007, the top 10 pro
athletes alone earned $287.5 million in endorsement income (1607). The reason for this
is probably linked to the fact that a majority of endorsement deals involve athletic shoe
manufacturers (Clark, Horstmann 1607), such as Nike and Adidas. A study documented
in the same article indicates that celebrities enhance brand recall (Clark, Horstmann
1606) when they are used in an advertisement. This must be considered when weighing
out the impacts of celebrity endorsements because there is now a question as to whether
the celebrity increases the appeal of the product or simply the likelihood of consumers
Craig Garthwaites article from the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, he
acknowledges the negative publicity [that surrounded] Tiger Woods alleged marital
infidelity in 2009 (79). According to Garthwaite, this event decreased the value of
products that Woods endorsed, causing firms to lose large amounts of money. In the
majority of cases, celebrities do have a positive influence on how consumers view digital
advertisements, however, there are clearly some instances where that is not the case. A
New York Times article by Sapna Maheshwari discusses how a simple statement from the
New Balance shoe company to the Wall Street Journal influenced many of the companys
consumers to stop buying their products and even throw their already bought shoes in the
garbage. The statement seemed to support Donald Trumps presidential campaign, saying
that [they] feel things are going to move in the right direction (Maheshwari B9). It was
later explained by the company that the statement was taken out of context and was not
referring to the campaign as a whole, but rather a business related aspect of Trumps
campaign. A study done by Anna Poghosyan and published by the European Scientific
Journal states that celebrities used in the promotion campaigns therefore are one of the
most effective ways to present a product or a brand by adding a special value and
importance to it (34), which helps explain the reason why negative publicity can shed a
A study done by marketing Professors, Dr. Jagdish Agrawal and Dr. Wagner A.
Kamakura showed that on average, investors [of companies] seem to value positively
the use of celebrities in advertisements (60). This study analyzed the success from using
1995, so the information is not relevant to digital news, but it is relevant in discussing the
Agrawal and Dr. Kamakura studied the abnormal stock returns of the companies used.
According to the results of this study, firms announcing contracts with celebrities
experienced a gain of .44% in excess returns (Arawal, Kamakura 59). Horstmann and
Clark used the results of this study to formulate the major points of their assessment and
found that celebrity endorsements lower the cost of reaching a given set of customers by
the brand[and has] the value and image required to advertise the brand (Wilson
Edzorna Dzisah, Chosniel Elikem Ocloo 197). As discussed, digital news can negatively
impact a product if the celebrity endorsing it has recently been involved in a displeasing
event. It can also, however, greatly affect a companys credibility if the person endorsing
its product is highly respected and adored by the public. The introduction of social media,
specifically Instagram, allows companies to reach out to popular public figures and pay
only 15% said that the presence of a celebrity dictated their decision to buy the product.
(Angela Sokolovska).
Over the past five years, companies began to use more than just television
commercials and billboards to advertise their products. Instead they have started to use
social media as its popularity continues to climb. The reason that companies have been
choosing social over other mediums is the fact that a large majority of people use social
media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram every day, multiple times per
day. The number of hours of television that people watch per day has decreased since
over the past few years since the release of Netflix, where users can stream movies and
TV shows for a monthly cost. As a result, marketers have turned to social media to insert
their product into the feeds of account holders. In an article discussing advertising on
Facebook, Doctor Kevin Curran, Sarah Graham, and Christopher Temple claim that,
social networking sites in general now account for one out of every five ads people view
online (26). This furthers the point made earlier about why marketers have turned to
social media. The question now becomes whether or not this method truly works better
than traditional advertising or not. Also, whether or not including a celebrity in these
Being able to reach a vast amount of viewers for the most economic price is an
important part of advertising. This is why social media is such an advantageous method.
Not only do marketers have access to hundreds of millions of potential consumers, but
they can also advertise for a much lower cost than traditional methods. As stated in the
article by Curran, Graham, and Temple, almost 1 in every 13 person in the world is an
active Facebook user (32) and the majority of these users are young adults. The
demographics for Instagram users are quite similar, that is, the majority of its users are
relatively young. As previously mentioned, these users are much more susceptible to
suggestion and, additionally, are usually more relaxed about spending [money] online
and generally have more of a disposable income to spare (Curran et. al. 33). This creates
a direct pathway for companies to reach consumers that are more likely to purchase items
seen in advertisements.
Instagram is not necessarily new to the social media world, but over the past five
years it has greatly increased its number of users since its beginning. According to two
different bloggers, the platform has increased its number of users from one million
accounts just 2 months after its launch (Irfan Ahmad) in 2010 to over 500 million
active monthly users (Sydney Parker) as of November 2016. The appeal of using
Instagram comes form the fact that Instagram is strictly photo and video content. As
opposed to the typical advertisement where the words do most of the persuading,
Instagram ads solely show a photo with a caption below explaining all of the product
details. While a percentage of companies have their own accounts and post
advertisements from there, other companies do that as well as paying celebrities to post
pictures from their accounts. Not only does this put the photo directly into the feed of the
celebritys followers, but it also appears to followers that the person advertising the
product truly finds the product useful and recommends it to the public. According to
another article by Maheshwari, this is because the photos appear as testimonials rather
than advertisements (A1), which entices viewers more than an obvious advertisement
demographics from 2015 by the Pew Research Center. Young people are often much
more vulnerable and susceptible to suggestion, which makes it much easier for marketers
One thing that Facebook does to enhance its advertising effectiveness, is allow its
marketers to create a page for their business as if it were a profile of a person. This makes
it easy on consumers by allowing them to click on a business profile and access photos,
links, and other informative details about any products the company sells. Also, the site
allows targeting based on demographic profiles and interests that users reveal about
themselves on their pages (Curran et. al. 29). This directs specific ads only to the people
who seem as though they would be interested in them, based on information from their
profiles. Similarly, Instagram allows businesses to make their own page, but unlike
Facebook, they do not have to have a personal account in order to make their business
page. Additionally unlike Facebook, Instagram is strictly photos and videos. The only text
comes from a short biography at the top of the users profile and the captions written
underneath each post. This seems much more effective because people look for what is
visually pleasing and exciting. Attracting people by photo is much more effective at
drawing the consumer eye. In recent years, Instagram has also enhanced its explore page.
This page was originally designed to see the most popular posts on the website at that
current moment; however, the site has been modified into a page that displays photos
based on user likes and similar accounts to those that they already follow. This brings up
the topic of celebrity endorsement because many of the posts on the explore page are
visually pleasing. Even if a user does not follow any celebrities, it is still likely that they
will encounter celebrity endorsements, simply based on the types of photos that they like.
decision on whether or not they should purchase a product. Not only is Instagram a
platform where people can share their own photos, but they also get to see their friends
photos in order to get the latest details on the exciting events going on in their lives. For
those who follow famous celebrity accounts, people can see what their favorite celebrities
are doing with their lives, which makes the public feel slightly less isolated from people
like Jennifer Aniston, Selena Gomez, Michael Phelps, and even the Pope. Because
companies know that these public figures are already influential, they have begun to use
Instagram as a platform for advertising. By doing so, the people that follow celebrities
can get the most recent news about which hair products, running shoes, makeup, and
sodas they all use. As stated earlier, these testimonials are almost never testimonials at
all, but instead are staged advertisements. While some viewers may realize what is going
on, those who are viewing these ads on Instagram are typically younger and, therefore,
may not know that its all a faade. There are few academic journals that discuss
Instagram directly and its important that academics address this specific platform
because it has, in fact, changed the way consumers see advertisements as well as the way
Endorsers: An Event Study Analysis. Journal of Marketing. 59. No. 3. 1995. 56-
62.
2. Ahmad, Irfan. Timeline of Instagram from 2010 to Present. Social Media Today.
http://www.socialmediatoday.com/content/timeline-instagram-2010-present-
use of celebrities in ads. Canadian Journal of Economics. 46. No. 4. 2013. 1606-
1636.
4. Curran, Kevin, Graham, Sarah, Temple, Christopher. Advertising on Facebook.
76-104.
7. Maheshwari, S. Endorsed on Instagram by a Kardashian, but is it Love or Just an
2016.
10. Pew Research Center. Instagram Demographics. Pew Research Center.
http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/08/19/mobile-messaging-and-social-media-
I think that starting this project was difficult, but revising it was much easier. At first, I
wasnt sure how to even construct my argument, let alone write the whole paper. I found
that it was best to take the concrete ideas that I had and set them up into simple
paragraphs that elaborated on that certain aspect. I think this was useful to me because it
helped me get a better look at all of the ideas I would be using to make my claims. Using
the peer review groups was very helpful because it gave two other perspectives from
people that we dont know well and therefor dont have a biased opinion of our writing. I
know that I have the potential to be a great writer, but sometimes I cannot critique my
own writing because it is simply too close to home. Even when I step back I have an
issue with finding the pitfalls in my own work. For me, the hardest part of my writing
process is articulating my thought process into words. I have had this issue since high
school, so I am well aware of it. I have great ideas, however, so when I finally decide
how I can put them onto paper, I am able to produce a clear and eloquent argument.
Structuring this project was slightly difficult because it wasnt a typical five-paragraph
structure that I have been used to using in my English classes. I was able to learn a lot of
digital news as well as my topic specifically through writing this paper. I learned that the
spread of news via the Internet greatly affects celebrity endorsements. Because people
use the Internet every day, multiple times a day, digital news platforms like social media
give companies access to millions of people at a time. This allows companies to reach out
to a variety of potential customers, rather than just their current customers or people of
the same demographic. Overall, I think that this paper went well and I was able to find a
variety of helpful sources to use in the construction of my argument. Not only was I able
to find academic journal articles, but I was also able to find an academic demographics
page from Pew Research Center, which helped a lot. I was also able to find a few great
newspaper articles online as well as some interesting blog posts. I found it interesting, yet
surprising that there were so many helpful sites that covered my topic. I do think,
however, that finding seven academic sources on my topic that I could actually use was
very difficult. I know and understand that it is necessary to have a variety of reliable and
credible sources, but I dont think that finding 7 journal articles were necessary for the
specifically so I ended up having to find articles about celebrity endorsement and other
forms of social media, which I then related to my topic to the best of my ability. Not only
was it difficult to find good academic sources, but also even with only five academic
sources, I felt that this paper was strong enough. I believe that my development
throughout this writing process will help me in any future writing assignments that I have
to do for other courses. I have learned how to evaluate my sources more than I had ever
previously done as well as how to find academic sources through great databases such as
JSTOR and EBSCO. I also learned that not all sources are created equally. I think that
while the majority of academic authors are intelligent, they are not always the best person
finding sources by picking and choosing which authors covered my topic to the extent
that I needed them to. I think that writing this paper has given me a lot of freedom as to
how Ive been able to address my topic, explain the issue at hand, and make an argument
regarding what I think about it. As a whole, I believe that it all came together smoothly
and all of the things that I struggled with eventually worked themselves out by the end of
the process.