Mahendra Singh Dhoni's Chennai Super Kings is struggling during the Indian Premier League as the team succumbed to its fourth defeat in its opening six games last evening (7 October), but the former Indian cricketer tops the list of celebrities in terms of recall value according to a survey conducted by the Indian Institute of Human Brands.
The company ran a telephonic survey on 4 October 2020 reaching out to 892 respondents to check-out recall of brands, their celebrities and their messaging. All respondents were between 15 to 35 years and 59% of them were male and 41% were female.
Among brands, Byju’s was the most spontaneously recalled. The celebrity endorser Shahrukh Khan trailed behind other celebrities who were more visible, hence more recalled. Dream 11 was at number two. The lead sponsors of the IPL have a campaign on air with multiple endorsers.
Swiggy, Mahindra Thar, Upgrad and Tata Altrox ranked highest amongst brands that did not use a celebrity.
In terms of celebrities, Virat Kohli was second on the list. Akshay Kumar is third and Ayushmann Khurrana is fourth on the list. Based on the research feedback, the IIHB team used its CELEBAR tool based on to assign a metric score to each celebrity and associated brand. The tool takes into account:
- Spontaneous recall of the brand
- Spontaneous recall of the celebrity
- Spontaneous recall of the brand and celebrity together
- Recency of communication
- Media weight behind campaign
- Solus versus multiple brands using the celebrity
Findings
- Dhoni had a CELEBAR score of 82. Spontaneous recall was a very high 72%. His association with Dream11 was also very high at 79%. He got 12% brand association with Oppo, 6% with AMFI and 2% each for Khatabook, TVS and Indigo Paints. If Dhoni had only been endorsing Dream 11, his CELEBAR score would have been near 100, given his strong association with that one brand to almost the complete exclusion of the other brands he endorses.
- Kohli scored 69 according to the CELEBAR tour. Most respondents recalled seeing Kohli as an endorser for brands. 20% associated him with Dream11 (he actually endorses MPL). This could be because Kohli endorses many brands and respondents tend to confuse what he endorses. Kohli is most associated with MRF (30%), Flipkart (29%), Himalaya (11%), Boost (10%) and Philips (8%).
- Kumar's CELEBAR score is 67. His highest recall was with Fortune (27%), PolicyBazaar (24%), Harpic (17%), Berger (9%), Kurkure (9%).
- Khurrana has a CELEBAR score of 55. His strongest brand association is with JSW Paints at 33%, followed by Urban Company at 12%, Polycab at 11% and Tide at 10%. Despite low association with Tide, Khurrana’s triple role was mentioned by many respondents though many got the brand wrong.
- Actors Shahrukh Khan and Aamir Khan are tied with a CELEBAR score of 52. Shahrukh had 72% association with BYJUs. But, not everyone spontaneously connected him to the brand he is endorsing. Last year, the association between him and BYJUs was stronger. Aamir is very strongly associated with PhonePe (81% positive connect). His association with Ceat tyres was only mentioned by 2% respondents. On probing almost all respondents failed to connect him to his robotic avatar in Ceat.
- Amitabh Bachchan had a CELEBAR of 32. Except, Flipkart (22%) and Dubai Expo (9%), the Big B did not find much mention. He also was mentioned by 2% for TVS. Bachchan’s score was matched by Anil Kapoor at 32 on CELEBAR with a high positive recall of 42% with CRED and 11% with Spotify.
Sandeep Goyal, chief mentor, IIHB, said, “So far in the IPL, MS Dhoni is the biggest celebrity. Virat Kohli trails. However, it is surprising that Shahrukh Khan has not done as well as the brand, BYJUs, that he represents. Aamir, though supported by much lesser media weightages, is a better performing celebrity this season at IPL. Non-celebrity brands have done well too. Swiggy, Thar, UpGrad, Altroz, Lenskart, MG Gloster, Facebook, Amazon, Kellogg’s, cricket.com, and VI were mentioned in significant measure by respondents. PhonePe and Swiggy were rated as the best ads of the ones on the IPL. But, the feedback on qualitative goodness was inadequate and is mentioned here only as part of data received by default.”
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