http://blogs.zdnet.com/sommer/?p=717
Currently it is nearly impossible to discuss branding without bringing up Tiger Woods. Though most of his sponsors have ended their deals with Tiger, except unsurprisingly Nike (there are just too many jokes to be made here with their slogan),
Accenture is a particularly interesting case. Many journalists/
bloggers have noted that
Accenture has gotten some of the best publicity because of the Tiger scandal, because before no one really knew what
Accenture was.
Accenture is a consulting firm, but everyone just knew them has a company that endorsed Tiger. This issue is extremely relevant to the Naomi Klein chapter. She discusses the risks companies take when using the images of celebrities. Often, the celebrity can become bigger than the brand and the brand gets lost. For
Accenture, they never really had a brand to begin with. For them, Tiger Woods became their brand, which is especially odd as I personally do not see the connection between a consulting firm and golf/Tiger Woods, and clearly neither did anyone else.
The above article also mentions how risky it is for any company to use a celebrity because, after all, celebrities are human and extremely capable of making mistakes like anyone else (probably more so). Not that the Tiger Woods episode is going to end celebrity endorsements. However, perhaps it will make companies think more carefully about who they choose.
The branding of Tiger Woods and his subsequent fall from society's good graces is really interesting to me too! On the one hand, this media circus highlighted how a celebrity's "branded image" can often have no relationship to their actual personality. Nike was very careful to brand Tiger Woods as someone who had the utmost personal integrity; Nike's very first ad depicts a group of young children, both boys and girls, who are racially diverse, looking into the camera saying "I am Tiger Woods." In this ad, Tiger is someone who children should look up to. In the Accenture ads, they say "Go on, Be a Tiger." Tiger's very name became synonymous with athletic drive, determination, and personal responsibility. As someone who always thought of Tiger as a "good guy," I personally felt cheated by Tiger, like he had lied to me! Tiger has made millions off of pedaling some "idealized athletic lifestyle" to the duped masses, including myself, how could he possibly betray me this this?
ReplyDeleteBut then I realize that this sense of disillusionment is equally my own fault for believing in this constructed reality so completely... After all, Tiger Woods, albeit a great athlete, is really just a man, and a flawed one at that. But this whole debate does bring up an interesting point of the risk that companies take in aligning themselves with the heavily constructed branded images of celebrity athletes and actors.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAnlcW_ILyw
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