Influencer marketing and brand endorsement: good strategy or jump to the cliff? 💡

☠️ “I can say anti-Semitic shit, Adidas can’t abandon me” - Kanye West on the “Drink Champs” podcast. Influencer marketing and brand endorsement: good strategy or jump to the cliff? 💡

There are several examples of brand endorsement by celebrities over the last few decades promoted by renowned brands.

In this type of strategy, brands enter into agreements with well-known personalities in society in general, making them ambassadors for their brands. Who doesn’t remember Cristiano Ronaldo’s Linic for Men or L’Oreal’s promotion with Eva Longoria?

In fact, according to Influencer Marketing Hub, more than 80% of marketers globally have a part of their budget dedicated to influencer marketing 🎯, which is one of the most used strategies not only by global brands, but also in smaller scale brands.

The benefits associated with creating partnerships and promoting through influencers are already well known:

✅Increased brand awareness

✅Unequivocal contribution to reinforcing the desired positioning

✅ Significant development of credibility and trust in the brand

✅ Expanded reach with more precise targeting

✅ Increased conversions

But what happens when it goes wrong?

In 2022, Kayne West (Ye), recognized ambassador and partner of Adidas, publicly spoke, in an interview with a lot of media coverage, about anti-Semitic mentions and comments considered sexually offensive 💣. Adidas fans were unforgiving and pressured the brand to take a radical stance. Five days after the biggest controversy broke out, Adidas took the decision to break the partnership with the American rapper.

Despite seeming like an obvious decision in terms of protecting the brand's reputation, the suspension of this partnership represented a loss of 250 million euros in profits and thousands of pairs of Yeezy (sneakers resulting from the artist's collaboration with Adidas) converted into monos . ⚠️ The value of Adidas shares fell 10% after the announcement of the completion of the partnership with the rapper.

Even so, the brand's image was very negatively affected, as identical behavior by the singer had been repeated for weeks, and Adidas fans punished the delay in taking a definitive decision regarding the suspension of this million-dollar partnership.

Using influencers to promote a brand or product continues to be part of countless marketing strategies (and well!), especially because, according to Hubspot, 31% of social media users say they discover new products through influencers 💡.

However, when making a decision, we must be extremely careful: choosing a personality that shares our brand's values is crucial. 👆

Carry out an in-depth analysis of the benefits vs. risks of this same exposure is also extremely important, bearing in mind that, as a brand, we will always have limited control over the content generated by partners 🔴.

#brandendorsement #influencermarketing #adidaskanye