Research On The Influence Of Spokesperson's Negative Events On Brand Image

With the rise of market maturity,the trend of product homogenization is increasing and the market competition is more intense.Jack Trout,the father of global positioning,pointed out that in the homogenization era,the competition among enterprises is no longer confined to competition among “products”,but lies in competition among “brands”.How to launch the brand strategy becomes the key for enterprises to win market competition.A lot of experience in brand building shows that the brand spokesperson that is easily by consumers to identify the image,can bring huge flow to products by virtue of his or her appeal and influence.It is a common practice to establish and transmit brand image and an effective tool to capture the hearts of the people for enterprises.Many enterprises don't hesitate to spend large sums of money to hire celebrities or other influential people to speak for their brands in order to promote the popularity and reputation of their own brands and gain competitive advantage.On the one hand,choosing right brand spokesperson can bring good advertising effectiveness to the brand and make the brand fame and fortune.On the other hand,opportunities and risks always coexist.Once the selection is improper,the result can be catastrophic,putting the brand in danger.With many celebrity spokesmen involved in negative events in recent years,scholars have heatedly discussed the consequences of spokesperson's negative events.What is the impact of the spokesperson's negative events on the brand image? Through what path does this effect occur? What role does spokesperson's responsibility level play in it? There are still many questions about this research.Based on a systematic review of the related literature,this study constructs a theoretical model among spokesperson's negative events,consumer perceived betrayal,spokesperson's responsibility level,and brand image.According to the inevitable conflict between reason and jurisprudence in the process of the construction of China under the rule of law,we discuss spokesman's negative events in terms of violation feeling behaviors and illegal behaviors,trying to find out their different effects on consumer perceived betrayal and brand image.By introducing the concept “perception of betrayal” in the interpersonal relationships study,this paper deeply studies how different types of spokesperson's negative events affect brand image through the intermediate variable “consumer perceived betrayal”,and analyzes how spokesperson's responsibility level plays an adjusting role in this process.In this study,first-hand data are collected by field experiment,then descriptive statistical analysis,reliability and validity analysis,Harman single factor analysis,variance analysis and hierarchical regression analysis are carried out by social statistical software SPSS 21.0.Finally,empirical quantitative conclusions are put forward.The conclusions of this study are as follows:1.There is a significant difference between the influence of violation feeling behaviors and illegal behaviors of the two spokesperson's negative events on consumer perceived betrayal;compared with illegal behaviors,consumer perceived betrayal caused by violation feeling behaviors is stronger.2.There are significant differences between the influence of violation feeling behaviors and illegal behaviors on perceived quality,brand personality and organizational image;compared with illegal behaviors,violation feeling behaviors cause each brand image dimension to be lower.3.The stronger consumer perceived betrayal,the lower perceived quality,brand personality and organizational image of the three brand image dimensions.4.When negative events of the spokesperson took place,spokesperson's responsibility level can regulate the relationship between consumer perceived betrayal and perceived quality,consumer perceived betrayal and brand personality,consumer perceived betrayal and organizational image.Based on the conclusions of this study,enterprises can start from the following aspects to reduce the risk of serious damage to the brand image caused by the negative events of the spokespersons,and enhance consumers' brand trust:1.Grasp inner values and norms of the social public and carefully select the brand spokesperson;2.Always pay attention to the words and deeds of the brand spokesperson to effectively avoid the risk of the brand spokesperson;3.Establish an efficient way of information transmission to reduce consumer perceived betrayal;4.Do a good job in crisis public relations to reduce consumers' perception of spokesperson's responsibility level in the negative events.