Like products, personality brands also enjoys some emotional attachments that make them sell. This explains why brand owners fall over one another to settle for successful celebrities as ambassadors. Beyond ambassadorial appointment, celebrities, either in sports or entertainment, can also be hired to endorse products.
The brand ambassador is meant to embody the corporate identity in appearance, demeanor, values and ethics. The key element of brand ambassadors lies in their ability to use promotional strategies that will strengthen the customer-product/service relationship and influence a large audience to buy and consume more. Predominantly, a brand ambassador is known as a positive spokesperson appointed as an internal or external agent to boost sales and create brand awareness. Today, brand ambassadors as a term has expanded beyond celebrity branding to self-branding or personal brand management.
It is believed that a brand, doing its job well, shows personality in all it does, not just marketing. The way they greet customers, the wording on their packaging and the way they answer the phone. All should show that personality. With these attributes they easily connect with consumers. Many brand management experts are of the opinion that a successful brand is a total experience that the consumer can identify with. To them, a consistent brand offering and experience is essential to build a brand personality. Problems arise when brands do things that are not congruent with their perceived personality.
Until recently, associating with Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu by any politician is believed to be a wise decision. Like celebrities, the name Tinubu sells other politicians and attracts supports. But in the last few years the name is little by little becoming a burden. Why some have linked the problem with blackmail from opposition, a few members of the public have said it failed because of lack of professional refreshing.
The Head of Mass Communication Department at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism, Ogba, Lagos, Mr. Jide Johnson, is of the opinion that ‘Tinubu brand’ fails because of complacency.
“Everyone owns their own personal brand. Companies and leadership must see the value of this concept for a successful social workplace recipe. No doubts, Tinubu was an exciting brand with many managers to manage it when it started. But it is obvious that he went to sleep when competitions were working to out-stage him. Perception makes or kills a brand. For Tinubu, the perception has become negative and he will need a lot of work to get it right. Today, except we are deceiving ourselves, the brand has failed. As a political brand, there is a need for frequent refreshing, especially after the Ondo State loss of his party. He obviously did nothing to revamp the spread of negative stories about him until the Ekiti election came and the party failed again. As it is, the party will be consumed in Osun, Oyo and other places if nothing is done to change the perception,” Johnson said.
Among other things, Johnson recommended the need for Tinubu to quickly address, through effective Public Relations, rather than propaganda, the allegation that he is a selfish leader who has turned the South-west States to his personal enterprise.
He cited the case of his controversial tax collection firm –Alpha Betta, his senator wife, his sister-in-law as house of assembly member in Lagos, son-in law as House of representative member representing Ekiti at the National Assembly and his daughter as Iyaloja General of Lagos.
He also advised the man behind the brand to adopt one of the laws in the 48 Laws of Power, which recommends the need for leaders to make themselves absent from the scene to earn respect. Above all, the Journalism teacher also urges Tinubu to quickly find a way to address the allegation that he insulted the sensibilities of traditional rulers from South-west, which opposition has been leveraging to puncture his brand equity.
