IT’S A DOUBLE-EDGED SWORD FOR CELEBRITY ENDORSERS

How should a celebrity protect herself from disrepute when a brand endorsed by her is mired in controversy?

May 2015 was an explosive month for Nestle India, and its predicament is far from over. Its popular instant noodles brand, Maggi, found itself in the eye of a storm with alarming levels of lead and monosodium glutamate found in the product in Uttar Pradesh. Samples were picked from other markets to test if it contain harmful ingredients. While the brand faces a nationwide ban, its former and current endorsers — actors Amitabh Bachchan, Preity Zinta and Madhuri Dixit — have been slapped with legal summons by a Bihar court, questioning their backing of an allegedly ‘harmful’ product.

While cases of rogue celebrities bringing disrepute to their endorsed brands with their offline behaviour are common, it is quite something else when a troubled brand drags its endorser into a mess of its own doing. With reputation and credibility at stake, what can celebrities do to insulate themselves from a brand endorsement gone wrong?

The fine print

Due diligence of an endorsement contract can’t be stressed upon enough. Marketers in the more evolved economies are known for watertight contracts that may even include conditions beyond advertising — including using the product during social appearances, not putting on weight, staying unmarried till the contract expires etc. In India though, this level of sophistication in contracts is not a reality yet — there is manipulation from both parties. In a standard contract, celebrities tend to put in a lot of clauses that exempt them from other appearances. For instance, a celebrity may endorse Pantene, yet have a clause that allows her to appear in a movie scene containing a Sunsilk in-film placement.

“A lot of conditions may even be implied or verbal,” says brand consultant Anand Halve of chlorophyll. Therefore, it is essential for celebrities to satisfy themselves on aspects of safety, health, criminality, use of hazardous materials etc, perhaps even obtain proof from the advertiser. For one simple reason: Under the Food Standards and Safety Authority of India Act, brand ambassadors can be fined up to ~10 lakh if he or she is party to a misleading advertisement. Not that it is a deterrent, but it matters.

Over the years, all major endorsement deals have included the ‘indemnification’ clause, which absolves the two parties of any responsibility for the other’s actions. “The endorser could also issue an insurance policy to cover all such eventualities,” advises brand consultant Samit Sinha of Alchemist.

In 90 per cent of the cases there are clauses that relate to brand rub-off negation. For instance, if a mango drinks endorser tweets that mango is not conducive to a healthy lifestyle, it becomes a case of indirect brand rub-off. A clause to this effect ensures the endorser doesn’t talk against the category either. “You must be aware of these, and prudent of the brand’s expectations from you,” says Hitesh Gossain, CEO of events marketplace Onspon.com and a former Percept Talent hand. Similarly, a celebrity must be aware of any creative that might bring disrepute depending on which market it is released. As things stand, a non-confrontational exit clause is part of most celebrity endorsement deals.

A ‘social’ celebrity

In April 2015, a print ad for Kalyan Jewellers featured endorser Aishwarya Rai sporting gold jewellery seated on a royal chair with an umbrella held over her head by a dark child. The ad, seen as promoting racism and child labour, went viral within hours through angry hashtags and with various industry bodies protesting, the ad was withdrawn with an apology from the advertiser and a swift explanation from Rai’s promoters.

Now take actor Irrfan Khan’s commercial for a company providing gadget insurance, which had a fan venting on social media about what he assumed the ad to be, and Khan clearing up the misunderstanding in consultation with his manager and the brand on social media itself. Obviously, not many celebrities display that level of accountability, but it certainly helps keep their image intact if they do.

Social media is where celebrities get a direct and immediate pulse of the masses and therefore, it is also the place where they are in greater control of the response they want to give to a particular incident. If the message is real, transparent and sometimes even apologetic (often even without culpability) it has the opportunity of gathering support as the storm passes over. But a word of caution: passing the buck or playing the blame game with the brand may not go down too well with consumers. Honesty, peppered with tact, can truly be the best policy.

Pick and choose

Quite unlike the Western world where the celebrity life cycle is long, Indian celebrities enjoy a shorter shelf life. From a human perspective, Indian celebrities want to cash their popularity as fast as possible, alternative sources of income and all. But a celebrity must resist the temptation of giving the nod to every assignment that comes her way. Musician AR Rahman and actor Aamir Khan are known to be picky about their endorsement deals and also demand ‘control’ of the creative to an extent. Says a leading Bollywood agent, “If a celebrity enjoys lapping up offers for the heck of making money, she will run the risk of trust deficit among fans.”

The second problem is choosing the right celebrity manager. In markets where the discipline is better evolved, one finds a more formalised, consultative approach to celebrity management, but in India, even now, some celebrities sign on brands ‘in good faith’. When you think of the revenue model for managers — it is based on revenue share with the endorser — it is easy to see why they sometimes push celebrities to accept all sorts of commercial contracts. Actor Irrfan Khan’s manager Manpreet Bacchhar believes that celebrities are answerable to their fans for what they claim in ad films on behalf of the brands they endorse and so it is never a good idea to make tall claims.

Introspection

“Celebrities don’t run detective agencies to verify every fact of the product claim. If the brand does something harmful, the celebrity is as much a victim as the consumer,” says Anirban Das Blah, CEO, CAA Kwan. But should an issue arise, it helps if celebrities behave more responsibly as they are the voice of a brand to millions of people. “If a brand has refuted terms, you should have the courage to walk out of the contract,” says a talent manager. Although there is no binding rule that an endorser has to also be a user of the brand, perhaps the way would be for her to imagine that she would use it and put that much scrutiny into the product.

Brands do protect their interests in the contract by stipulating the dos and the don’ts for the endorser, but the reverse is not so prevalent here. “But public memory is short— one hit film is all it takes to wipe out all past transgressions,” quips MG Parameswaran, executive director, FCB Ulka Advertising.