Celebrities as Influencers for Brands: Questioning the Believability Factor

Take a look at this Instagram post. A smiling Priyanka Chopra is photographed in her home kitchen preparing a drink with a can of Bon & Viv Spiked Seltzer. It's made very clear it's a paid partnership thanks to the social media platform allowing influencers to disclose they're publishing sponsored content.

With the actress's ginormous 54.2 million following, this particular post received 921k likes and 3.9k comments. That's a 1.69% engagement rate based on this commonly used formula >> Engagement Rate = (Likes + Comments) / Followers x 100. Now, that's not surprising for a celebrity with a huge following. There are many articles indicating that people with a mega following greater than a million can see engagement rates between 0.7% - 1.7%. 

But scroll through the comments (as far as your patience lets you browse through the thousands of comments), and you will notice that most of the comments (if not all) are random, with fans expressing their love for her, or follower hungry Instagrammers simply dropping a comment in the hope their own accounts get some traction, posts generated by bots, and then posts like this one in the screenshot below by @sane_vegan. Unfortunately for Bon & Viv, there isn't one comment from a follower inquiring more about the brand, its pricing or availability or about them agreeing or disagreeing with her about their experience with the product.

So, did Bon & Viv have to part with an arm and a leg to pay Mrs Chopra Jonas for this one post? You bet! This July 2019 Economic Times article claims the actress charges INR 1.35 crores (i.e. 13.5 million rupees) per sponsored post. Don't widen your eyes with surprise. According to this Social Media Today article, Dwayne Johnson with 147M+ Instagram followers reportedly charges $882k per paid post. With her 37M+ followers, makeup industry icon Huda Kattan charges $91k.

The question thus arises, can Bon & Viv consider this post successful?  If you look at the picture itself - it's not bad, it's simple, not coming across as photoshopped, the product in question has a decent visibility, and the celebrity looks happy using it. But my issue with it is the absolute lack of authenticity. It's becoming tiring to see picture after picture of celebrities endorsing products that they in reality they may have had no genuine consumption history with. And this is also where the actual content of the post needs more thought - how can the story told in the post come across as real? Consumers today are intelligent. Do they buy a product simply because they see a picture of a celebrity using it?

As a teen, I remember watching an ad on Indian cable TV where a Bollywood actress claimed she swore by a new shampoo line launched under an established brand name. Even then, young as I was, all those years back (and way before I knew what marketing was), I recall questioning to myself: Really, does she use this shampoo? The one that's available in a sachet for less than 5 rupees from my local grocer? And how does she claim in the ad that she's been using this shampoo when it's only just launched? I just couldn't wrap my head around it. For me, celebrity endorsements lack credibility factor, especially if the content is not well thought out.

In my first job in PR (we're talking pre-Instagram era), I saw the brand-celebrity relationship at play up close. An up and coming Bollywood star was one of three Bollywood actresses roped in to endorse a hair color brand. I was put to the task to generate some content around this partnership, beginning with arranging an appointment for her to actually get her hair colored with that particular product in a partner salon. Interestingly, her hesitation was evident with the number of questions she asked the hairstylist about the product just before he was to apply it on her hair: Would this color suit her? Would the chemicals in it damage her hair especially considering she was shooting for some movies? But way before that point, the money had been exchanged, the contract had been signed. So why the questions? That was the first time the actress was using the hair color brand that she was endorsing. Clearly, it was about the money and the perceived value the said celebrity and FMCG giant held.

But let's come back to the Priyanka Chopra post. Given we can only imagine the astronomical $$$ Bon & Viv would have paid her, the post failed to generate any curiosity about the product, its flavours, its availability, options for usability and pricing. Full disclosure, this is not her first and only post with/on Bon Viv. She has done at least 3 or so posts previously, with content shedding light on incredible everyday women making a difference working on the frontlines during the pandemic. Her Instagram Live with the brand even resulted in this piece of coverage on Vogue about her donation and...her nude cardigan! So what they've got right is a sense of continuity of influencer association.

But with this partnership what I want to question is the ROI that is being achieved by the brand and if the expected astronomic partnership fee is justified? What do brand Bon Viv and PC have in common? I'm not privy to the brand's objectives when it comes to its influencer marketing strategy. But would they find more success partnering with believable micro influencers? Or even 'power medium influencers', the likes of Stanley Tucci, someone who comes across as more genuine, who loves preparing and drinking beverages. I'm betting in the affirmative! Evidence demonstrates that not only do these bracket of influencers offer higher engagement rates but also they tend to have a more genuine, non-PR and more natural approach to creating and posting brand-centric content. Influencer marketing works if the brand finds the right kind of influencer to partner with, otherwise you're burning up marketing investment that could generate higher returns in alternate avenues/channels.

This is another brand partnership between Crocs and PC that doesn't seem authentic to me.
As a consumer, do I believe she wears or has worn Crocs before? Ummm I don't think so. 
Would she want to be spotted /captured by the paparazzi whilst sporting her Crocs? Very likely not.
Does she accept a huge cheque to endorse the brand? Yes. 

For brands like Crocs as with Bon & Viv that have a very 'everyday functionality', they may find more success partnering with influencers that to consumers have an 'everyday' or 'accessible' appeal. Because in a world with too much noise, it's the authenticity of the narrative that will help brands cut through.