Recently, an advertisement endorsed by film and television star Yang Mi has been overwhelmingly displayed on subways and buses, with repeated shouts of "This is a magical website" making people avoid it. Celebrity endorsement of Internet products has become increasingly popular in the past two years. Yao Chen endorses Zhaopin recruitment and Ganji.com, Wang Luodan, Han Han and Huang Xiaoming endorse Vancl Eslite, Yang Mi endorses Catwalk.com and 58.com, Peter Ho, Yu Na and Qin Lan endorse Tuanbao.com, Han Geng endorses Jumei.com, Ge You endorses LaShou.com, and Fan Bingbing endorses Meng Bazaar. Wait, it’s dizzying.
The choice of celebrities as spokespersons shows that the Internet industry has entered an era of fierce brand competition with the support of venture capital funds. Industry insiders analyze that the unprecedented popularity of celebrities endorsing Internet products will, on the one hand, help to increase the visibility of both parties and bring about brand effects. On the other hand, it will squeeze the market space of a group of Internet companies with insufficient capital reserves, which may lead to the collapse of the Internet industry. A new round of shuffling.
Brand building needs
According to Maslow's demand theory, when buyers no longer consider price and quality as purchasing concerns, using the celebrity's popularity to increase the added value of the product can cultivate consumers' feelings for the product and win consumers' support for the product. sought after. This is also the purpose of many Internet companies vying for celebrity endorsements.
"Since Ganji.com was founded in 2005, it has reached a period of rapid growth, and it can now focus on promotion." Bai Rubing, marketing director of Ganji.com, said that from the spokesperson's point of view, Yao Chen is more approachable and fits the temperament of Ganji.com. . In addition, the "Queen of Weibo" Yao Chen is a star with relatively Internet characteristics, and netizens are very receptive to him, which has accelerated the brand marketing of Ganji.com.
According to the Baidu Index, the average search volume of Ganji.com increased by 161% after adopting three-dimensional advertising. The word "Ganji.com" also rose to 16th on Baidu's search rankings, becoming the leading classified information website on the list. Relevant data also shows that the per capita page views of Ganji.com have also increased from the previous 9 pages to 13 pages, and user stickiness has increased by 44%.
"For the current relatively chaotic Internet industry, brand communication through celebrity endorsements should be regarded as an exploration. It can be regarded as a great progress for the brand development of the entire Internet company." In this regard, Mengtian Network Fan Xiaoning, the company’s president, said that companies inviting celebrities to speak for themselves can win over the customer base to a certain extent. Most of the “fans” who love celebrities are between the ages of 18 and 28, and this group is also the target user group of Internet companies. , using star effect can also increase the company's visibility and market influence. In addition, with the booming development of China's Internet market, online advertising prices have skyrocketed this year. Therefore, many companies have chosen to reduce online advertising and instead go offline for brand building. In brand building, asking celebrities to endorse can be said to be the most direct and simple way.
Fan Xiaoning believes that the purpose of any enterprise is to make profits, and holding hands with celebrities is a quick and effective method. Nowadays, for group buying websites that are relatively homogeneous, creating a unique brand image is the goal pursued by every enterprise, and inviting celebrity endorsements is undoubtedly the most intuitive and effective way to convey the brand image. In addition, whether it is the Internet or other industries, users have become the core of corporate competition. Companies have begun to pay more attention to quality and user experience, and competition has also moved from the efficiency level to the customer service level. Therefore, looking for celebrity endorsements can, to a large extent, fix a part of the user base and build popularity.
"Double-edged sword"
"Celebrity endorsement is a 'double-edged sword.'" Some people in the industry believe that in the short term, it is indeed easy to gain public attention through the eyeball effect of celebrity endorsement. Choosing a suitable celebrity spokesperson can help people through consumption in a short period of time. It can increase readers’ familiarity and preference for “celebrity faces”, thereby increasing their awareness and favorability of their own brands, but at the same time, there are also some problems.
For example, remembering celebrities cannot remember brands. If the relationship between the spokesperson and the brand is not obvious, or no integration point is found in the advertising creativity, one's own brand will eventually be overshadowed by the star's light. In addition, celebrities endorsing multiple products may cause a brand dilution effect, and multiple brands in the same category have celebrities endorse them, which may also cause confusion among consumers. Of course, choosing celebrity endorsements will definitely lead to a sharp increase in publicity costs, which not only refers to the celebrity endorsement fees, but also the corresponding advertising and marketing activity costs. There is an upper limit to the marketing budget of any company. Spending large sums of money on celebrity endorsements will inevitably lead to a reduction in marketing expenditures through other conventional channels.
Fan Xiaoning believes that companies looking for celebrity endorsements can allow users to recognize products through celebrities, thereby improving corporate efficiency. At the same time, international and big-name celebrities can also help companies go global and improve their international image, thus greatly enhancing the company's core competitiveness and brand premium. A low-cost LV leather bag can be sold for tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of yuan through celebrity endorsement and use. This is the brand premium. However, water can carry or capsize a boat, and the same goes for celebrity endorsements. A company has gained a lot of attention and revenue because of a certain star, but if one day the star's own image is damaged, the company's image will also be significantly reduced.
Therefore, celebrity endorsement is not a panacea. While igniting attention in a short period of time, Internet companies must figure out what their core competitiveness is and how to survive after collectively "burning money", instead of "igniting themselves and prospering the night sky." ".
"Burning money"?
In the eyes of some outsiders, asking celebrities to endorse is a kind of "burning money" behavior. It is understood that Ganji.com’s advertising expenditure is 400 million yuan, Yao Chen’s endorsement fee is as high as 8 million yuan; Yang Mi’s 58 local advertising endorsement fee is about 3 million yuan.
"In any industry, there is the behavior of 'burning money'. It depends on how you grasp this degree." Fan Xiaoning believes that celebrity endorsements that are accurately positioned and consistent with the company's own image will help the company to increase its visibility and obtain high reputation to a certain extent. amount of income. However, if you blindly pursue big-name celebrities, without considering the company's own conditions, and pin the company's survival on celebrities, the result will only be to increase the celebrity's worth, but you will lose your wife and soldiers.
Zhang Haijun, CEO of Kuxun Travel Network, believes that inviting celebrity endorsements is an effective method for corporate promotion. Not only in the Internet field, many traditional companies also have many classic cases. Inviting celebrity endorsements can indeed quickly increase the visibility of a company, but it has no impact on Internet companies. It can only speed up the construction of Internet brands, learn from the experience of traditional companies, and apply it to the Internet field. With the development of the Internet today, more companies have realized the importance of brand value to corporate growth, and inviting celebrities to endorse is a natural phenomenon.
"'Burning money' can be viewed from two aspects. If one's own products and services are not ready yet, but a huge amount of money is invested in advertising, such behavior is a kind of 'burning money' behavior; if a company has already If you have accumulated your products and services to a certain level and are confident enough to retain users and provide users with unique value, investing more money in construction is not a waste of money; A need for strategic development. If multiple companies have similar product and service models, or there is a strong competitive relationship between them, if the company's brand influence and brand loyalty can be quickly enhanced through brand building, Inviting celebrities to endorse is a good means of competition," Zhang Haijun said.
Of course, according to the development process of China's Internet industry, every large-scale "money-burning" promotion of Internet companies is driven by the power of capital. If the boom in 2000 made ordinary people in China understand what surfing the Internet is, then the boom in 2011 seems to be telling consumers how to use the Internet to make our lives more convenient. From this point of view, some people believe that the role of "burning money" in popularizing education for consumers to use the Internet is worthy of recognition, and its role in promoting the industry is also obvious.
Regarding how the Internet industry should develop rationally, healthily, and steadily, many people in the industry believe that solving the core value of their products and services is the key. In other words, any Internet company must work hard to build products and services with unique value and form sufficient competitiveness in its development process. As for the speed at which it builds its own brand or the scale of investment, this is not a fundamental issue. If an enterprise has formed sufficient competitiveness in its products and services, even if it invests money in brand building, it will still be a healthy and rational development.