Exploring the Relationship Between Celebrity Worship and Brand Equity: The Mediating Role of Self-brand Connection

Abstract

The main objective of this research is to investigate the triadic relationship among celebrity worship, self-brand connection and brand equity. Specifically, it aims to investigate the role of self-brand connections as a mediating variable in the relationship between celebrity worship and brand equity. The results of the conditional process analysis revealed that celebrity worship influences brand equity through direct as well as indirect pathways. It reveals that there is a direct and positive influence of celebrity worship on brand equity. It also finds that the consumer self-brand connection mediated the effect of celebrity worship on brand equity, extending support for the indirect influence on brand equity enrichment. The findings of the study offer key insights for academicians and marketing practitioners. It is one of the pioneering studies in the field of celebrity worship which helps academicians decipher the impact of celebrity as idols on the endorsed brand equity. Brand managers can use the findings for targeting niche consumer segments who are celebrity worshippers as they are more likely to remain loyal to the brand. They can also benefit from developing relationships with consumers as these may transform into long-lasting benefits for the brand.

Keywords

Celebrity worship self-brand connections brand equity India

Introduction

According to McCutcheon et al. (2003), celebrity worship is the fascination of an individual towards a public figure. Stever (2009) defines celebrity worshipers as ‘a collection of individuals who experience uncontrollable and obsessive emotional bond with their role model’. Celebrity worshiper groups comprise of the individuals demonstrating tremendous love and attachment for a celebrity (Raviv et al., 1996). It is a type of false intimacy wherein people engage with the public figure (McCutcheon et al., 2003) and the actions of the celebrities affect the individuals who worship these celebrities. Almost three-fourth of the younger population are closely associated with the celebrities at some point of time in their lives and depict higher levels of affection towards them (Boon & Lomore, 2001). This can be seen in the case of celebrities like Lady Gaga, who is successfully able to control and persuade her fans (Kowalczyk & Royne, 2013). This shows that celebrities are able to influence fans, but a much more important question for the marketers is that whether celebrity worship leads to building brand equity.

Farquhar (1989) defines Brand equity as ‘the incremental value added by a brand name to a product’. Existing academic research (Keller & Lehmann, 2006; Yoo et al., 2000) discovers different marketing actions that can be performed to develop brand equity. They have established that celebrity endorsement facilitates construction of brand equity (Dwivedi et al., 2015), and the celebrity endorser as a secondary association becomes linked with a brand in the consumers’ memory (Spry et al., 2011). However, the question ‘How does the process of celebrity worship works to enhance brand equity?’ remains unanswered. Houran et al. (2005) and Holt and Thompson (2004) accentuate that consumers establish a virtual parasocial relationship with their favourite celebrities, which would further lead them in deciding their brand-related behaviours. Consequently, celebrity worship modifies the way the consumers react to an endorsed message in evaluating the brand and in enhancing brand equity as is also reiterated by Dissanayake and Weerasiri (2017). Hence, it becomes vital for the marketers to empirically ascertain a relationship between the celebrity worship dimensions and consumer-based brand equity as the relationships among these measures have not been investigated in past studies.

Consumers build their self-concept by using brands; they appropriate the symbolic meanings of brands derived, in part, from celebrity endorsement (Escalas & Bettman, 2009). Consumers consider celebrity endorsers as a personification of positive associations relating to their personality and lifestyle (McCracken, 1989; Sharma, 2016). On the basis of these associations, consumer’s affection towards celebrities may turn into obsession for many consumers (Rojek, 2001). Consumers may start to believe that consuming brands endorsed by their favourite celebrity will create self-fulfilment and transform their lives (Reeves et al., 2012). In accordance with McCutcheon et al. (2002) view, we expect consumers to address self-definitional needs through celebrity worship. Both absorption addiction model and self-brand connection discuss the consumer’s deficits within their real life. Relationships with celebrities are seen as an attempt to cope with or escape from reality, and it also discusses how consumers are using brands and celebrity endorsers to actually enhance their self-concept. Despite the similarity between theoretical underpinnings of celebrity worship and consumer self-concept, there has been no study which has used both of these measures and delved into the effect of celebrity worship on self-brand connection.

The objective of the current study is to examine the relationship between celebrity worship and brand equity. It also aims to study the mediating impact of consumer self-brand connections on the relationship between celebrity worship and brand equity. A better understanding of these relationships will influence the brand marketing exercise, as celebrity worship has turned out to be a worldwide trend (Ang & Chan, 2018; Udo & Nwulu, 2015). It will also help marketing scholars to unearth the pragmatic application of the idea of celebrity worship and its consequence on endorsement success and would also enable them to suitably redesign the marketing communication strategy. It also offers a framework for managers to justify targeting individuals with higher levels of celebrity adoration as the potential consumers for their products.

The current research is also significant from the viewpoint that it is conducted in the Asian background, particularly in Indian setting. India is one of the major consumers of celebrity advertising (Ghuman et al., 2019; Mahanta & Sangameshwaran, 2010; Mann et al., 2020; Parmar et al., 2020a, 2020b). Research also shows that more than 50 per cent of the total advertisements in India comprise of a celebrity endorser (Duff & Phelps, 2019). Celebrities also have the benefit of an exceptional position in the Indian society (Jain, 2011). Few celebrities in India are even worshipped as demigods and have temples constructed in their name (Roy & Mishra, 2018). Therefore, these facts justify the conduct of the present celebrity research on Indian consumers.

Theoretical Framework and Hypotheses Development

The Absorption Addiction Model

According to McCutcheon et al. (2003), the absorption addiction model explains how celebrities arouse a cognitive connection with the consumers through psychological absorption. The model states that few individuals develop a sense of uniqueness and satisfaction by such psychological interaction with a celebrity.

Giles (2000) discusses that in this modern era of global community, celebrity worshipping is a result of multiple information and advertising channels. Individuals who are actively involved in celebrity worship achieve absorption through concentrated attention. Absorption produces an emotion of the celebrity’s presence in the individuals’ lives and convinces them to attain more information about the worshipped celebrity. Further, these individuals shift from retention phase to a different stage, probing for other diverse mediums of fresh knowledge concerning the admired celebrity (McCutcheon et al., 2003).

McCutcheon et al. (2003) recommended that there are three different phases of celebrity worship, namely entertainment social, intense personal, and borderline pathological, which can be measured on a scale to categorise different individuals preoccupied with the celebrities. These dimensions were established in a celebrity worship scale and consequently, it developed into the celebrity attitude scale (CAS). The entertainment social dimension posits that the individual develops a communal degree of curiosity in their favourite celebrity by viewing them perform on TV and movies; reading articles about them in a newspapers, blogs and magazines; and learning about different aspects of their favourite celebrity lives through the social networking sites. It signifies the casual appreciation that individuals hold towards the admired celebrity. The entertainment social dimension also adds to the entertainment value provided by a celebrity, thereby giving immense pleasure to the general public. Intense personal dimension postulates that an individual has more demanding and obsessive emotions towards the worshipped celebrity and frequently displays those emotions among the individual’s friends or other fans of the celebrity. People who display these feelings consider themselves to be individually related with the worshipped celebrity. They continuously imagine about the liked celebrity and connect with them parasocially. In borderline pathological condition, an individual feels an extraordinary connection with the celebrity. Individuals are connected to the celebrity to an extent that they are ready to do anything for the celebrity. This powerful attachment often lays the foundation for the followers to employ extreme behaviours, thereby encouraging them to work beyond their common sense.

Previous academic research has shown that most of the research related to celebrity worship has been conducted in the psychology and branding context. It has illustrated the relationship between celebrity worship and other measures, such as, different cognitive measures (McCutcheon et al., 2003), Eysenck’s personality dimensions (Maltby et al., 2003), poorer mental health (Maltby et al., 2004), fantasy proneness and dissociation (Maltby et al., 2006), different attributional style and self-esteem (North et al., 2007), willingness to have elective cosmetic surgery (Maltby & Day, 2001), different measures of religiosity (McCutcheon et al., 2014), motives for viewing television (Martin et al., 2015) and love attitude scale (McCutcheon et al., 2016). Previous academic research also shows that celebrity worship impacts materialism and compulsive buying (Reeves et al., 2012), consumer attitudes towards brand extensions (Kowalczyk & Royne, 2013), destination image (Yen & Croy, 2016) and consumer purchase intentions (Singh & Banerjee, 2018). Ang and Chan (2018) revealed that three major factors, namely celebrity products, celebrity traits and peer influence influenced the respondents to become celebrity worshippers. Roy and Mishra (2018) also found that there are different entertainment motives which influence the success of endorsement among worshippers and non-worshippers. However, there has been no research relating celebrity worship to brand equity.

Celebrity Worship and Brand Equity

Keller (1993) states that the quantity and quality of brand associations existing in the consumer’s memory lead to the creation of brand equity. It implies that brands which have larger and detailed information networks in the memory of the consumer enjoy enhanced brand equity (Dwivedi et al., 2015). Pappu et al. (2005, 2006) define brand equity as ‘the value that consumers relate with a brand, as highlighted by the four dimensions, namely, brand awareness, brand associations, perceived quality and brand loyalty’. This conceptualisation of consumer-based brand equity has also been accepted in the literature pertaining to celebrity endorsement as is highlighted by the work of Spry et al. (2011) and Dwivedi et al. (2015).

Existing research shows that the construct of celebrity worship has been conceived as a skill of self growth, aiding and offering a feeling of accomplishment for few persons (Boon & Lomore, 2001; Giles & Maltby, 2004; McCutcheon et al., 2003). Celebrity endorsement helps to endow a brand with a well-liked image (Keller, 2013). In the eyes of the consumers, celebrities symbolise a group of people whom they look up to for aspiration. The process of celebrity endorsement instils a brand with the desired associations which are expected to influence consumers’ brand assessment (Dwivedi et al., 2015). Consumers worship those celebrities who are considered as influential icons and for whom they have high regard. These influential icons impact consumers’ brand evaluations and consumer behaviour (Hung, 2014). Celebrity worship integrates a celebrity’s actions into the life of the consumer. The consumers tend to follow each word and action of their favourite celebrity. Thus, this psychological connection between the celebrity and a consumer aids in strengthening the brand evaluations by the consumer (Dissanayake, 2015). Therefore, we propose the following hypothesis:

H1. Celebrity worship has a direct and positive effect on consumer-based brand equity.

Self-brand Connections

Escalas (2004) states that self-brand connection is the development of a powerful and significant bond between the brand and the consumer’s personal characteristics. Self-brand connection grabs the consumer’s tendency to construct self-related images with the brand (Sprott et al., 2009). Escalas (2004) confers that the consumers are frequently occupied in the development of their personal identity as well as required images. Celebrities, as human brands, are vital means by which these needs of a consumer are achieved (Belk, 1988; Mann et al., 2020). Celebrities have powerful representative associations which are crucial in establishing consumer’s sense of self, thereby enhancing and reinforcing the consumer’s self-image (Dwivedi et al., 2015). Escalas (2004) states that celebrities extend powerful emotional bond with a consumer for a long duration of time, leading to positive attitude towards the brand and the consumers’ behavioural intention. Thus, self-brand connection potentially gives details relating to important brand-associated consequences. In the subsequent section, we discuss how celebrity worship aids in building self-brand connection.

Celebrity Worship and Self-brand Connection

Belk (1988) states that consumers employ brands for formation and preservation of their individuality. Consumer self-brand connection indicates a higher intensity of individual’s recognition with the brand (Albert et al., 2013). O’Guinn (1991) finds that consumers are stimulated to worship celebrities in order to accomplish their social as well as spiritual needs. The absorption addiction model also discusses that the consumers use the distraction by the celebrities to calm their empty self. Celebrities provide lifestyle solution for the worshippers by their brand endorsements. The individuals feel satisfied by the use of endorsed brands (Reeves et al., 2012). Robertson and Gow (1999) confer that the absorption symbolises consumer’s illusion of relationship with the celebrity, which leads them to heightened emotional desire. Consumers are seeking external gratification to remedy and soothe internal self-deficiencies, and celebrity worship works as a means to accomplish this. Accordingly, celebrity worshippers undertake activities which help them in accomplishing their want for absorption.

Escalas and Bettman (2015) find that consumers are more likely to accept brand meanings from aspirational celebrities. Celebrity worshippers substantiate grounded dissociative practices by also developing a connection with the endorsed brand, keeping in view that their main goal is to be emotionally connected with the celebrity. The emotional investment may take place when a celebrity worshipper interacts with a celebrity even in case of a non-personal manner such as watching a brand endorsement of a celebrity (Roy & Mishra, 2018), and this may translate to a better connection with the brand. Therefore, we anticipate that celebrity worship directly influences consumer self-brand connections. Hence, we can posit the following hypothesis:

H2. Celebrity worship has a direct and positive impact on self-brand connections.

Self-brand Connections and Brand Equity

A celebrity is a part of the aspirational reference group who possesses value-expressive attitudes for the general public (Bearden & Etzel, 1982). Further, this celebrity appeal facilitates consumers in establishing a required self-image (Moore & Homer, 2008). Self-brand connection is created as the adoration for the worshipped celebrity is transmitted to the brand during the celebrity advertising phenomenon. When a consumer is able to develop self-brand connection, they may achieve additional advantages, for instance, an improved consumer self-image, better societal acceptance and uniqueness (Escalas & Bettman, 2003). Moreover, accomplishment of positive consumer image-related merits assists in laying a stronger foundation for information relating to the brand (Keller, 1993), thereby affecting endorsed brand equity (Dwivedi et al., 2015). Construction of consumer self-brand connection explains how consumers build relationship with the celebrities and transfer the celebrity adoration to the endorsed brands. Thereby, we suggest the following hypothesis:

H3. Self-brand connections have a direct and positive impact on brand equity.

Mediating Impact of Self-brand Connections

When individuals become fans, they generate empathy for the celebrity endorsed brand. Further, it encourages fans to learn more about the brand, and they like to experience the brand themselves by its application (Yen & Croy, 2016). Higher degree of celebrity worship of the fans can be transformed into self-brand connection and can affect the brand equity of the endorsed brand. Dwivedi et al. (2015) also found the mediating impact of self-brand connections while studying the influence of celebrity endorser traits on brand evaluations. Taking cue from this, we also expect that the consumer self-brand connection may act as a mediator in the relationship between celebrity worship and brand equity as given in Figure 1. Hence, we posit the subsequent hypothesis:

H4. Self-brand connection mediates the impact of celebrity worship on brand equity.

Methodology

The present research is conducted in North India due to the fact that marketers mostly use celebrities from North Indian movie industry (Bollywood) as compared to South India and consumers are easily able to identify with them (Venkatesakumar et al., 2012). Following Singh and Banerjee (2018), the respondents were asked about their favourite celebrity and the brands endorsed by them. They were required to list a minimum of two brands endorsed by their favourite celebrity. Only those respondents who correctly answered the celebrity–brand combinations were further asked to fill the questionnaires of the study. Those respondents who were not able to identify their favourite celebrity–brand combinations were excluded from the study. The initial sample of the study consisted of 500 respondents. However, some of the questionnaires were eliminated as there were more than 30 per cent missing answers (Wirtz, 2004) or inconsistent answers (Bidmon, 2017), thus resulting in the use of 438 questionnaires for the study. The sample comprised of 232 (52.97%) males and 206 (47.03%) females. The ratio of final sample size (438 respondents) and observed variables (27) is more than generally established proportion of 10:1 (Dwivedi et al., 2015) and thus, making it fit for the current research. Quota cum judgemental sampling method was applied to warrant that the sample was balanced and representative of population census data. Judgemental sampling warranted that the respondents are fit for the current research, whereas quota sampling method focused on respondents’ age and gender, and thereby, reflected the actual population distribution of Punjab, a province in northern India. Quota cum judgemental sampling also helped to counterbalance biases of the respondent (Mann et al., 2020). Mall intercept survey technique was used to gather data responses. The randomness of the sample was ascertained by administering the questionnaires to individuals who were from diverse social and economic sections in 10 distinct supermarkets (Gatti et al., 2012). These supermarkets were considered as apt for the study as they had different marketing positioning approaches recognised on account of their product price, quality and perceived quality of the service. Further, the sample randomness was further increased by arbitrarily selecting the weekday and time for the process of gathering data as is also reiterated by Simintiras et al. (1997). The respondents aged from 21 years to 45, and approximately the same amount of individuals (85) were chosen from each of the five selected cities, namely Mohali, Jallandhar, Ludhiana, Amritsar and Patiala of Punjab. The details of the celebrity–brand combination and demographic profile of the respondents are given in Table 1.

Figure 1.

Source: The authors.

Table 1.

Results of Celebrity-brand Combinations and Demographic Profile of Respondents

Celebrity-brand Combinations			Frequency
Shahrukh Khan—BYJU			12
Shahrukh Khan—Denver			7
Shahrukh Khan—Hyundai			12
Shahrukh Khan—Big Basket			6
Shahrukh Khan—Dish TV			3
Amitabh Bachchan—Tanishq			19
Amitabh Bachchan—ICICI Prudential Life			5
Amitabh Bachchan—Kalyan Jeweller			12
Amitabh Bachchan—Dr. Fixit			4
Amitabh Bachchan—Cadbury			9
Akshay Kumar—Harpic			26
Akshay Kumar—Kajaria Tiles			22
Akshay Kumar—Nirma			14
Akshay Kumar—Honda			12
Akshay Kumar—Policy Bazaar			22
Ranvir Singh—Thums Up			9
Ranvir Singh—Jack and jones			15
Ranvir Singh—Adidas			12
Ranvir Singh—Head and Shoulder			17
Alia Bhatt—Sunfeast Dark fantasy			8
Alia Bhatt—MakeMyTrip			6
Alia Bhatt—Caprese			9
Deepika Padukone—Tanishq			15
Deepika Padukone—Axis Bank			12
Deepika Padukone—OPPO			6
Deepika Padukone—Lux			4
Deepika Padukone—L’Oreal Paris			13
Virat Kohli—Too Yum			23
Virat Kohli—Vicks			37
Virat Kohli—Royal Challenge			42
Virat Kohli—Valvoline			13
Virat Kohli—Wrogn			17
Salman Khan—Thums Up			15
Salman Khan—Dixcy Scott			12
Salman Khan—Wheel			9
Salman Khan—Britannia			12
Salman Khan—Revital			17
Salman Khan—Being Human			25
Aamir Khan—Coca Cola			5
Aamir Khan—Godrej			12
Aamir Khan—Tata Sky			19
Aamir Khan—Vivo			8
Aamir Khan—Monaco			6
Katrina Kaif—Lux			6
Katrina Kaif—Slice			19
Katrina Kaif—Pantene			22
Katrina Kaif—Olay			10
Mahendra Singh Dhoni—Colgate			8
Mahendra Singh Dhoni—Livfast			10
Mahendra Singh Dhoni—Indigo Paints			4
Mahendra Singh Dhoni—Cars24			22
Sachin Tendulkar—Smash			8
Sachin Tendulkar—Quaker			6
Sachin Tendulkar—DBS Bank			9
Sachin Tendulkar—BMW			13
Hritik Roshan—Mountain Dew			23
Hritik Roshan—HRX			31
Hritik Roshan—OPPO			29
Ranbir Kapoor—Oreo			6
Ranbir Kapoor—Panasonic			21
Ranbir Kapoor—Renault			15
Ranbir Kapoor—Lays			31
Demographic Profile of Respondents
Variables	Categories	Number of Respondents	Percentage of Total Respondents (n = 438)
Gender	Male	232	52.97
	Female	206	47.03
Age (years)	21–25	101	23.06
	26–30	91	20.78
	31–35	88	20.09
	36–40	80	18.26
	41–45	78	17.81
Educational qualifications	Below matric	8	1.26
	10+2	34	7.76
	Bachelor’s degree	185	42.24
	Master’s degree	199	45.43
	MPhil/PhD	12	2.74
Occupation	Service	128	29.22
	Business	117	26.71
	Self-employed (profession)	53	12.10
	Student	97	22.15
	Housewife	43	9.82
Family income (monthly in ₹)	≤30,000	63	14.38
	30,001–50,000	47	10.73
	50,001–70,000	153	34.93
	70,001–90,000	63	14.38
	90,001–110,000	85	19.48
	≥110,000	27	6.16
City	Amritsar	94	21.46
	Jalandhar	86	19.63
	Ludhiana	88	20.09
	Mohali	83	18.95
	Patiala	87	19.86

Source: The authors.

Measurements

The survey items adapted from numerous studies were measured on a 5-point Likert scale with 5 for strongly agree to 1 for strongly disagree. As shown in Table 2, the survey items consisted of three constructs, namely celebrity worship, self-brand connection and brand equity which have been explained as follows:

Celebrity Worship

The celebrity worship scale is measured by using nine items from CAS (McCutcheon et al., 2002; Singh & Banerjee, 2018). The scale comprises of items associated with three aspects, namely entertainment social, intense personal and borderline pathological. The celebrity worship scale consisted of three items for measuring entertainment social (α = 0.84), three items for intense personal (α = 0.80) and three items for borderline pathological (α = 0.91).

Self-brand Connections

We adapted seven items from self-brand connection scale developed by Escalas and Bettman (2003). The item ‘I (can) use the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity to communicate who I am to other people’ was eliminated from the study owing to low factor loading. The remaining six items were found to be adequately reliable and valid for the construct.

Brand Equity

We measured brand equity by using 14 items borrowed from Spry et al. (2011). It consists of four dimensions, namely brand awareness, brand associations, perceived quality and brand loyalty. The items pertaining to brand awareness ‘Some characteristics of the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity come to mind quickly’ and perceived quality ‘The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity offers excellent features’ were eliminated from the study due to low factor loading. The brand equity scale consisted of two items for measuring brand awareness (α = 0.78), three items for brand loyalty (α = 0.81), four items for brand associations (α = 0.81) and three items for perceived quality (α = 0.90).

Data Analysis

We examined common method bias (CMB) by applying Harman single factor test. The results of the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) reveal that the total factors of the study accounted for 73.84 per cent of the total variance and the first factor accounted for 28.34 per cent of the variance, which is less than majority of the variance. Hence, there is no issue of CMB. Following Koay et al. (2020), Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) using Smart PLS version 3.2.7 was applied for data analysis due to two reasons. First, the current model for the research was intricate and comprised of both reflective and second-order formative constructs (higher-order constructs). Second, PLS aids in better management of small sample size data or non-normal data. Following Hair et al. (2016), the model was operationalised to evade type I and type II errors. Therefore, the present research considered both celebrity worship and brand equity as reflective formative higher-order constructs while self-brand connection as reflective first-order construct.

The two-phase analytical procedures suggested by Anderson and Gerbing (1988) have been used in the present study. It examined the measurement model by determining reliability and validity of the measures. Subsequently, the structural model tested both direct and indirect effects of the hypothesised relationships. There is difference in the assessment conditions of measurement model for reflective and formative constructs (Hair et al., 2016). Further, to know more about the internal consistency and convergent validity of the reflective constructs, outer loadings, average variance extracted (AVE), and composite reliability (CR) are stated. Additionally, the discriminant validity of the constructs has been examined by means of Fornell and Larcker (1981) criterion. Nevertheless, for ensuring multi-collinearity of the formative constructs, the results of variance inflation factor (VIF) and outer weights significance after bootstrapping are reported. A bootstrapping approach was applied to examine the significance of the path coefficients and the loadings (Hair et al., 2014).

Estimation of Reflective Measurement Model

Table 2 explains that outer loadings of all the reflective constructs are greater than the lowest limit of 0.50 as recommended by Hair et al. (2016) and accomplished the internal consistency. Correspondingly, the results of CR demonstrate that all the reflective constructs display adequate reliability as the values of CR are greater than 0.70 (Hair et al., 2016). Moreover, the constructs exhibit adequate convergent validity as the values are more than the lowest limit of 0.50. It also discloses that every item is showing more than 50 per cent of the variance in each of their particular construct (Hair et al., 2013).

The discriminant validity is measured by means of Fornell and Larcker (1981) criterion. Table 3 reveals that the values of square roots of AVE of each construct are greater than the correlation value of the constructs. Therefore, discriminant validity is ascertained for the constructs.

Evaluation of Formative Second-order Constructs

The evaluation of formative second-order constructs is demonstrated in Table 4. The multi-collinearity of the inner model was checked before the measurement of the structural model. It illustrates that all the VIF values of the inner model are less than the threshold limit of 5 (Diamantopoulos & Siguaw, 2006), describing that each of the constructs is distinct and irreplaceable. Moreover, the significance of outer weights (after bootstrapping of 5,000 samples) also discloses the significance of all of the first-order constructs and vital for their particular second-order formative constructs. Therefore, the convergent validity of the second-order formative constructs was ascertained.

Table 2.

Internal consistency and Convergent Validity of Reflective Constructs

Constructs	Factors	Statements	Loadings	AVE	CR
Celebrity worship (CW)	Entertainment social (ES)	I enjoy watching, reading or listening to my favourite celebrity because it means a good time.	0.80	0.84	0.63
		Keeping up with the news of my favourite celebrity is an entreating pastime.	0.87
		Learning the life story of my favourite celebrity is a lot of fun.	0.72
	Intense personal (IP)	I love to talk with others who admire my favourite celebrity.	0.71	0.80	0.57
		It is enjoyable just to be with others who like my favourite celebrity.	0.69
		I like watching and hearing about my favourite celebrity when in a large group of people.	0.85
	Borderline pathological (BP)	The success of my favourite celebrity is my success also.	0.89	0.91	0.78
	Borderline pathological (BP)	When my favourite celebrity fails or loses something it feels like my failure.	0.87
		When something good happen to my favourite celebrity I feel like it happened to me.	0.89
Self-brand connections (SBC)		The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity helps me become the type of person I want to be.	0.80	0.90	0.60
Self-brand connections (SBC)		I consider the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity to be ‘me’.	0.81
		Feel a personal connection to the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity.	0.80
		The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity suits me well.	0.77
		I can identify with the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity.	0.73
		The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity reflects who I am.	0.75
Brand equity (BE)	Brand awareness (BA)	I can recognize the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity.	0.83	0.78	0.63
Brand equity (BE)	Brand awareness (BA)	I am aware of the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity.	0.76
	Brand loyalty (BL)	The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity is usually my first choice.	0.86	0.81	0.59
		I would not buy any other brand of the product if the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity was available at the store.	0.75
		I feel loyal to the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity.	0.68
	Brand associations (BAS)	I like the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity	0.72	0.81	0.51
	Brand associations (BAS)	I trust the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity	0.71
		I would feel proud to own the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity.	0.73
		I have no difficulty in imagining the brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity in my mind.	0.71
	Perceived quality (PQ)	The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity is very reliable.	0.83	0.90	0.76
	Perceived quality (PQ)	The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity is of very high quality.	0.86
		The brand endorsed by my favourite celebrity is of very consistent quality.	0.92

Source: The authors.

Note: CR = Composite reliability; AVE = average variance extracted of the constructs.

Table 3.

Mean, SD and Discriminant Validity: Fornell and Larcker Criterion

Constructs	Mean	SD	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
1. PQ	3.80	0.98	0.87
2. SBC	3.62	0.94	0.48	0.77
3. IP	3.26	0.99	0.40	0.36	0.75
4. BAS	3.26	1.00	0.43	0.39	0.42	0.72
5. BL	3.49	1.02	0.35	0.36	0.22	0.22	0.77
6. BP	3.32	1.15	0.21	0.25	0.48	0.19	0.19	0.88
7. BA	3.83	1.04	0.46	0.48	0.27	0.38	0.16	0.15	0.80
8. ES	3.44	1.01	0.28	0.29	0.47	0.16	0.20	0.50	0.11	0.80

Source: Fornell and Larcker (1981).

Note: SD = Standard deviations; the diagonal values (in bold from columns labelled 1 to 8) are square root of AVE and the values in the lower half of the matrix are the phi-coefficients between the constructs.

Table 4.

Outer Weights Path Significance and Multi-collinearity

Paths	ß	SD	T-value	p-Values	VIF
ES → CW	0.42	0.059	7.57	0.000	3.63
IP → CW	0.27	0.058	4.50	0.000	3.16
BP → CW	0.69	0.055	14.61	0.000	2.83
BA → BE	0.34	0.069	4.03	0.000	3.16
BL → BE	0.49	0.066	7.06	0.000	3.63
BAS → BE	0.38	0.073	4.53	0.000	3.66
PQ → BE	0.30	0.067	4.72	0.000	3.35

Source: The authors.

Table 5.

Direct Paths Assessment

Paths	ß	SE	T-value	p-Values	VIF	R²	Q²	ƒ²
CW → BE	0.84	0.019	40.63	0.000	1.00	0.73	0.62	1.85
CW → SBC	0.92	0.023	78.87	0.000	1.00	0.83	0.65	5.42
SBC → BE	0.82	0.032	37.54	0.000	1.00	0.69	0.67	1.93

Source: The authors.

Table 6.

Mediation Analysis

Mediation Path	ß	SE	T-value	p-Values	LLCI (2.5%)	ULCI (97.5%)
CW → SBC → BE	0.76	0.031	29.73	0.000	0.69	0.80

Source: The authors.

Results

Evaluation of Structural Model

In reference to the results in Table 5, celebrity worship was shown to have a significant positive influence on brand equity (H1: CW → BE, ß = 0.84, p < 0.001) and self-brand connection (H2: CW → SBC, ß = 0.92, p < 0.001), thereby leading to acceptance of H1 and H2. Moreover, self-brand connection (H3: SBC → BE, ß = 0.82, p < 0.001) was observed to yield a significant positive influence on brand equity, which was in support of H3.

Mediation Analysis

The present research has applied a bootstrapping procedure with 5,000 resamples for the mediation analysis with a biased corrected confidence interval as recommended by Hair et al. (2016) and Hayes and Preacher (2010). Table 6 shows that Self-brand connection mediates the relationship between celebrity worship and brand equity (H4: CW → SBC → BE, ß = 0.76, p < 0.001) and the confidence intervals did not comprise of a value of 0 (Nitzl et al., 2016), hence H4 is supported.

Discussion

The findings of our study reveal that celebrity worship exercises direct and positive significant effect on brand equity, thereby facilitating the application of celebrity worship measure for brand construction and extension exercises. It is also consistent with the McCutcheon et al. (2003) absorption addiction model which makes a consumer feel sufficiently connected with the celebrity. The absorption aspect helps to develop a deep imaginary relationship with the celebrity, and the addiction aspect leads to enhanced brand value. In the process of celebrity endorsement, these parasocial relationships get transported over to the endorsed brand (Reeves et al., 2012), thereby enhancing the brand equity by adding positive associations to the endorsed brand (Singh & Banerjee, 2018). These results are also consistent with the work of Kamins et al. (1989) and Dwivedi et al. (2015) who confer that celebrities have the ability to add an element of attractiveness in the advertisements and also enhance the brand equity. The findings are supportive of the associative network memory theory (Keller, 1993). When a celebrity gets associated with a brand through endorsement process, the celebrity associations get transferred over to the endorsed brand as it gets linked with positive associations. Cultural meaning also transfers from celebrity endorsers into brands through the endorsement process (McCracken, 1989).

The results reveal that in case of entertainment social dimension, the individual is connected with worshipped celebrity due to a number of celebrity characteristics residing in consumer memory. These characteristics get reproduced via the endorsed brands (Wang et al., 2013) and finally, result in enhanced and positive brand equity. In case of intense personal dimension, consumers generate positive emotion towards brand endorsed (Till & Shimp, 1998), which further enhances consumer-based brand equity. Further, in case of borderline pathological dimension, the individuals experience a stronger degree of celebrity worship as they lack reasoning capabilities (McCutcheon et al., 2003), thereby resulting in low information processing which further benefits the process of celebrity endorsement.

The results also illustrate direct and positive impact of celebrity worship on self-brand connection. It is in accordance with the work of Roy and Mishra (2018) which also suggests that consumers who worship celebrities have invested a lot in a celebrity emotionally and this relationship gets transferred to the endorsed brand. It also coincides with Belk (1988) and Sirgy (1982) who confer that consumers make use of brands to accomplish self-definitional needs. The results are consistent with McCracken’s (1989) meaning transfer processes that suggest that consumers use endorser-related meanings to partly shape an individual sense of self. Thus, the three dimensions of celebrity worship, that is, entertainment social, intense personal and borderline pathological, may enable consumer readiness to integrate these celebrity meanings into their existing self-concept. The results also depict direct and positive influence of self-brand connection on brand equity. The finding adds significantly to the developing literature on self-concept (Sirgy, 1982) and the Keller (1993) associative network memory theory of brand associations. It is also in accordance with the work of Dwivedi et al. (2015) who also found a positive relationship between these two constructs. In reference to this, developing a potent brand with higher equity is vital for companies because higher brand equity signifies that people are more brand aware, brand loyal and perceive better quality of the brand. These positive results may lead to increased consumer purchases. In addition, consumer will also pay more for a brand with higher positive brand equity as compared to the cheaper options available in the market. The mediation results show a dual path to enhancing endorsed brand equity, one with a positive and direct influence on brand equity and another with an indirect path through consumer self-brand connection. The results of this study indicate that self-brand connection significantly impacts endorsed brand equity.

Theoretical and Managerial Implications of the Study

The findings of the study offer key insights for academicians and marketing practitioners. It is one of the pioneering studies in the field of celebrity worship which helps academicians decipher the role of a celebrity as idols and its impact on consumer brand equity. The present research builds on the foundation of absorption addiction theory and adds to the existing literature of the self-concept by identifying that consumers are using celebrities for fulfilling their self-concepts. The addictive aspects of celebrity worship can strengthen the ‘false’ beliefs about their relationship with the celebrities and promote brand equity. In this process of celebrity endorsements, self-brand connection may be considered as the method for elucidation of how celebrity worship transforms into enhanced brand equity. Celebrity worship activates the inner self of the consumers and consequently triggers positive brand responses. Academicians can gain from the research by understanding details of how the process of celebrity worship functions and can be used for positive brand evaluations.

Marketing practitioners can effectively apply the results of the present research considering the fact that a brand is a firm’s vital asset and its equity is a matter of huge significance for them. The current study signifies that celebrity worship is a useful means for constructing brand equity circuitously via developing self-brand connections and recommend framework for choosing an impactful celebrity endorser. The results of the study also provide detailed information to marketers which can be used by them for better targeting of the consumers. First, the marketers may strategically recruit and select only those celebrities who are highly worshipped to establish a potent level of engagement with potential consumers. They may also utilise consumer’s self-brand connection as a gauge of their favourite celebrity’s ability to engage consumers when selecting a celebrity for the endorsement process rather than only laying emphasis on the celebrity rankings on the basis of their economic worth. Second, celebrities who are highly worshipped can be effectively used for positioning or repositioning of the brands by matching the traits of the worshipped celebrity with the product attributes. Third, brand managers can target niche consumer segments who are celebrity worshippers as they are more likely to remain loyal to the brand endorsed by the celebrities. They can target those consumers who have a high need for information as they will be more influenced by celebrity endorsement as compared to others. Fourth, the finding of the current research also provides direction for new and international firms seeking entry into India by illustrating celebrity worship as an effective means of marketing planning and building associations with consumers and improving brand evaluations.

Limitations and Scope for Future Research

This study suffers from a few limitations. First, this study is conducted in Indian context. Future studies can investigate the research in different cultures and sub-cultures, which shall provide more insights into this phenomenon. Second, this study does not make any comparisons on the demographics of the sample. Future research can study the influence of various demographic factors, such as, gender age, and education, on the findings of the results. Third, this study does not take into account any moderators, such as the level of consumer involvement with a product and endorser product congruence. Future researchers may dwell on such areas.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

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