Why Celebrities Are Paid Crores for Ads, And Why Most Brands Still Fail with ThemQ

Dec 27, 12:06PM

The Celebrity Paradox

Every year, brands pour crores into celebrity endorsements, betting on famous faces to boost awareness, trust, and sales. Big names dominate billboards, TVCs, IPL time slots, and YouTube pre‑rolls yet many of these campaigns barely move the needle on recall or revenue. If celebrities “work,” why do so many high-budget ads flop in the real world? This article explores that paradox by unpacking the economics of celebrity fees, the psychology behind why they can be effective, and the execution gaps that turn powerful assets into costly missed opportunities.

Why Celebrities Are Paid Crores

·         Reach at Scale

Celebrities offer instant, mass‑market distribution: one ad across TV, digital, outdoor can reach millions in days, across metros and smaller towns, in multiple languages. That kind of reach, if bought only via media, would itself be expensive; the celebrity adds amplification on top.

·         Trust Transfer Effect

Fans subconsciously transfer their feelings about a celebrity admiration, trust, aspiration onto the brand they endorse, a phenomenon known as “meaning transfer” or borrowed credibility. When a widely trusted figure endorses a product, people often assume it’s safer or better without deep evaluation.

·         Attention Economics

In an environment where users skip, scroll, or block ads, celebrities act as attention shortcuts. Eye‑tracking and neuroscience work shows that people look longer at famous faces, and that those faces can speed up decision‑making even if viewers consciously focus more on the person than the product

·         Cultural & Emotional Influence

Celebrities embody success, style, and status; in markets like India, they can operate as aspirational role models whose choices signal what is “in” or respectable. Their presence taps into identity, lifestyle aspirations, and community belonging, shaping how people feel about entire categories (not just single brands).

 

The Psychology Behind Celebrity Endorsements

Celebrity endorsements leverage several cognitive biases and social dynamics:

• Authority bias: People are more likely to follow perceived high‑status or expert figures, trusting their recommendations with less evidence.
• Halo effect: Positive feelings about a celebrity’s talent or character spill over into perceptions of unrelated domains like finances, health, or tech products.
• Familiarity bias: The brain favors familiar stimuli; repeated exposure to a face makes it feel safer and more trustworthy, which can extend to the brands they endorse
• Parasocial relationships: Fans often form one‑sided emotional bonds with celebrities, feeling they “know” them; this perceived relationship increases the weight of their endorsements.​

Neuroscience research suggests that celebrity endorsements can activate brain regions linked to trust and reward, strengthening memory encoding for the product and improving attitudes especially when the celebrity is seen as congruent with the category.

Then Why Do Most Celebrity Ads Fail?

Despite these advantages, high visibility does not guarantee impact. Many celebrity campaigns fail because they confuse attention with effectiveness. A famous face can open the door, but it cannot rescue weak strategy, lazy creative, or misaligned expectations. The problem is rarely the celebrity alone; it’s how they’re used.\

Reason #1: Poor Brand–Celebrity Fit

One of the biggest failure points is mismatch. When the celebrity’s image, lifestyle, or perceived expertise doesn’t align with the product:

• Viewers feel the ad is purely transactional.
• The endorsement doesn’t feel believable or relevant.

Common mismatch patterns:

• A luxury‑positioned celebrity for a low‑trust, mass‑market product with quality issues.
• A youth icon fronting a solution clearly meant for older audiences.
• A celebrity known for health and discipline endorsing indulgent or contradictory products.

Research shows congruence between celebrity image and product category strengthens conditioning and improves attitudes; poor fit weakens the effect and can even create skepticism.

 

Reason #2: Celebrity Overshadowing the Brand

Another frequent issue is the “vampire effect”: people remember the celebrity, not the brand or message.​

• Viewers can describe the ad and the actor in detail but not the product name.
• The narrative or humor centers on the star’s persona, leaving little room for clear positioning.

When the viewer’s cognitive load is fully occupied by the celebrity, the brand becomes background decoration, and the campaign mainly builds more equity for the individual, not the company.

Reason #3: One‑Time Campaign Mentality

Many brands treat endorsements as fireworks, not as part of a long‑term signal.

• One big burst during a season or launch.
• No follow‑up, no story arc, no continuity.

Brand memory and association build with repetition and consistency, not isolated exposures. Long‑term, multi‑year associations (think classic ambassador relationships) typically outperform short, one‑off flights because they steadily fuse celebrity identity with brand meaning over time.Ws\X

Reason #4: Weak Creative & Messaging

A strong celebrity can’t fix:

• Generic, category‑level scripts anyone could deliver.
• Forced product placements that break immersion.
• Zero emotional hook no humor, no story, no tension, no resolution.

When the creative doesn’t give the star a believable role or a memorable idea, the ad feels like a collage: insert celebrity, show logo, say tagline. That underuses both the budget and the brain science behind endorsements.

Reason #5: Expecting Sales Instead of Brand Impact

Celebrity campaigns are best at:

• Top‑of‑funnel awareness
• Trust lift
• Faster brand recognition and consideration

They are not typically built for immediate conversion spikes on their own. When brands expect a single endorsement to carry the entire performance load without strong offers, distribution, pricing, or digital/retail integration they misalign objective and tactic. The ad can move perception, but if the funnel, product, or availability are weak, sales will underwhelm.Ws\x

Celebrity Ads vs Influencer Marketing

Celebrities

• Reach: Very high, often national.
• Cost: Very high.
• Interaction: Mostly one‑to‑many, broadcast style.
• Perception: High status, broad appeal; sometimes less “relatable.”

Influencers

• Reach: Smaller, often niche or community‑based.
• Cost: Lower per collaboration.
• Interaction: Two‑way; comments, lives, DMs, community feel.
• Perception: More accessible, peer‑like, often higher perceived authenticity in specific niches.

Brands often misuse both by picking celebrities when niche influence is needed, or overscaling influencers for mass‑market launches without enough reach. The best strategies position celebrities as broad signal senders and influencers as depth and community builders.

Patterns Seen in Successful Celebrity Campaigns

Campaigns that consistently work usually share these characteristics:

• Long‑term association: Celeb and brand stay together long enough to build a mental link.
• Clear brand positioning: The ad communicates a distinct promise beyond “X uses this.”
• Strong creative storytelling: The celebrity fits into a story that highlights the product’s role.
• Repetition across platforms: TV, digital, OOH, and in‑store all reinforce the same idea.
• Authentic fit: The celebrity genuinely feels like they’d use or recommend the product.
• Supporting ecosystem: Digital content, social amplification, retail visibility, and PR all extend the core message. ​

 

What Brands Usually Underestimate

• The audience’s ability to spot inauthentic or lazy endorsements.
• The need for consistent brand cues across ads, not just a famous face.
• The importance of strong creative and clear messaging.
• The power of frequency and continuity over one‑off bursts.
• The role of digital, search, and retail in converting awareness into sales.

Celebrities are paid crores because in an overloaded attention economy, they reliably deliver reach, salience, and psychological shortcuts that can boost awareness and trust. But attention alone doesn’t build brands or guarantee sales. Most failures stem from weak strategy, poor fit, and underpowered creative not from the presence of the celebrity. Endorsements work best when psychology, positioning, storytelling, and consistency all align around a clear role for the star within a well-designed marketing ecosystem.

Understanding why some celebrity campaigns become case studies while others vanish after a quarter helps brands make smarter decisions about visibility, storytelling, and long‑term impact.