Explore the effect of celebrity in advertising

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Methodology

Based on this conceptual framework, we argue that a consumer's (denoted by i) instantaneous purchase attitude () toward a promoted product (denoted by j) advertised by celebrity k on a given purchase occasion n is composed of deterministic () and stochastic (e(n)) terms; thus,

(1)

where e(n) is independent of , and possibly caused by unknown extrinsic variables. Now, this work rationalizes the structure of using a multi-attribute attitude form composed of three main constructs, i.e., celebrity endorsement (), product attributes , and price considerations , based on the proposed conceptual framework. Thus, is given by

(2)

where , , and are the instantaneous evaluations of consumer i with respect to the collection of attributes of product j, net product value, and celebrity endorser k on a given purchase occasion n, respectively; and , , and are the time-varying strengths of consumer beliefs associated with , , and , respectively. As consumer purchase attitudes may change over time [12], these consumer evaluations and belief strengths are defined as dynamic forms to rationalize the time-varying features of these variables and parameters.

According to Lavidge and Steiner [26], and are likely affected by attributed performance of celebrity endorsement in any one of four phases (awareness, knowledge, liking, and preference) utilized in the consumer purchase decision process. For instance, a consumer may prefer product A over B due to admiration for the celebrity endorsing product A, who thereby increases consumer preference for product A. If the celebrity is well known and has considerable experience and expertise associated with the promoted product, consumer-expected product price or quality may increase, leading to a cognitive response that increases consumer belief in a celebrity endorsed product [8]. Accordingly, we propose that and can be functions of , which are derived as follows:

Celebrity endorsement construct

Assessing endorsement performance is a critical step as it is the independent construct influencing other constructs in the proposed conceptual model. Notably, the entire conceptual framework is rooted in individual decision contexts, where is assessed based on consumer perceptions. As expected, such an assessment problem can involve consumers scoring multiple criteria, such as credibility and attractiveness, in qualitative domains. Considering the fuzziness and vagueness that may be encountered by consumers when assessing celebrity endorser performance, this study constructs the assessment framework for the celebrity endorsement construct using the fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (Fuzzy-AHP1). According to Bouyssou et al. [27], Fuzzy-AHP is a method particularly suited to dealing with decision-making problems with multiple criteria in qualitative domains, in which a finite number of decision alternatives are evaluated via a finite number of performance criteria.

First, based on the previous work [6] and [14], this study uses credibility and attractiveness as the two primary criteria for assessing celebrity endorser performance (i.e., ). This study accepts the argument that consumer attitudes may not change significantly without external stimuli, such as promotional and advertising activities, including celebrity endorsement advertising strategies. However, this study considers the direct and indirect effects of celebrity endorsement on consumer attitudes. We argue that such endorsement effects are ...