Celebrities in Ads: Why It Works and When It Doesn’t

Twenty years ago if I said the name Peter Crouch to you, there’s a fairly high chance his footballing career would be the first thing that sprang to mind. But since his retirement from playing in 2019 he and wife Abbey Clancy (equally family friendly thanks to winning Strictly Come Dancing in 2013) have successfully kept themselves at the forefront of the public imagination in quite a different way. Part of their staying power can certainly be attributed to their podcast ‘The Therapy Crouch’ and their status as a British celebrity power couple, but at time of writing they have been the face of brands as diverse as Ariel, Victorian Plumbing, Chery UK, Screwfix and Paddy Power over just the past year.

Danny Dyer too has joined the ranks of Paddy Power as one of the faces in its latest ad, alongside his work for Deliveroo, Walkers and Sky Broadband. Idris Elba, Alison Hammond and Claudia Winkleman may be household names but in between watching them dazzle on the small screen we can regularly see them trying to sell us stuff in the ad breaks. Fresh from his ‘Celebrity Traitors’ breakthrough Joe Marler looks set to establish himself in mainstream culture not only with his winning personality, but also his deals with loveholidays and Ancient + Brave.

We can all agree these celebrities are beloved, respected and accomplished in their fields, which naturally translates into them being a solid choice as brand ambassadors. However, why do some stars attract so many brand deals? What are the key ingredients that make somebody a successful fit with a brand? Is there a danger of them becoming over-exposed? What happens when a celebrity’s association with a brand begins to overshadow the product itself?

​John Barton, founder and MD/ECD at Thumbstoppers, highlights why certain celeb-backed campaigns often resonate with audiences. He tells LBB, “In these very uncertain times celebrity use in advertising is less about fame and their individual audiences and more about reassurance. In a low-trust, high-noise world, recognisable personas offer clarity and cut through where subconsciously the right audiences pay more attention or in the case of socials – stop the scroll and follow a call to action.

“I suspect figures like Peter Crouch, Danny Dyer, and Idris Elba work because of the qualities each persona brings to the table. Crouch brings self-aware humour that disarms cynicism. Dyer offers blunt authenticity that cuts through waffle and delivers relatability, maybe even spikes trust. Elba signals calm authority without ego. I think the repeated use of ambassadors provides emotional clarity at a time when audiences are tired/sceptical of over-engineered brand messaging.”

Yet John also points out the risks of this approach, adding, “The moment the celebrity’s gravity outweighs the brand’s, you stop building equity and start renting it. Warning signs include the audience referencing the person more than the product, diminishing impact despite high recognition, or the brand struggling to exist without that face.”

​Ben Shaw, group head of strategy at Smarts, agrees that the question of building equity is key, and that a celebrity having too many endorsements can ultimately be damaging for a brand. "Too many brands borrow equity instead of trying to build it, " he explains. “They're looking for short-term relevance instead of a long-term relationship. When you think of Nespresso, you think of [George] Clooney. When you think of Clooney, you think of Nespresso. When I think of Peter Crouch, I think of his podcast, not any brand that he's been involved in.

“Brands can capitalise on cultural moments to cut through, but really should be asking ‘are we investing in a brand asset or just renting attention?’. Certainly, that's what their CFO will be asking.

“Not enough brands are thinking about how they can build their own equity in individuals, whether that is famous faces from the brand's history, their leadership, their makers or create their own famous faces through mascots.”

Atomic Supernova’s founder and Talent & Brands managing partner Raf McDonnell points to one of the most iconic celebrity-brand relationships of all time – Gary Lineker and Walkers.

Having worked on the campaign himself, he tells LBB, “What made that campaign so successful over the long term was the fit between Gary’s character and values and the campaign idea of ‘no more Mr Nice Guy’ and the ability to develop the campaign through various decades and agencies using the same successful formula.

“There is a big difference between using a celebrity to just endorse your product versus a brand ambassador, which requires a greater brand fit and has the potential for a longer-term successful brand association.

“There is a risk of over-exposure by celebrities appearing in multiple campaigns and I am surprised brands would choose to engage a celebrity that is already heavily associated with another brand, but unless the brand wants to pay for total all-category exclusivity, the talent will always be able to work in other non-competing categories, and potentially water down the impact of the celebrity association.”

You’d be hard pressed to find anyone in the UK who isn’t familiar with Gary Lineker’s love of crisps. But sadly not all celebrity-brand partnerships are created equal.

​John deGraft-Johnson, strategy partner at ARK, argues that there are some serious disadvantages to having a famous face that brands need to reckon with. “Brands spend millions beaming celebrities to homes across the country. It’s a huge benefit for the celebrity, but brands pay them for the privilege,” he says.

“We know celebs just do it for money, they don’t use the product, and half of them don’t even have the temerity to look like they’re having a good time. And they claim to need millions to go near grubby advertising? With the ever present celebrity scandals, brands should be getting danger pay for going near them. (Sorry to any brands associated with brand Beckham right now).

Drama gets them column inches, but it gets campaigns pulled. Dairy Milk has been around for 120 years and is loved by millions. Should they risk associating with someone who has been around for five years, with some dodgy tweets in their history and doesn’t trouble the official list of national treasures?”

​Dentsu Creative UK strategy director Heather Griffiths has even coined a word to describe this apparent celebrity overload. She explains, “Growing up, my friends were in the business of creating new words – one of which was ‘lumptitious’ – the act of noticing something more because it got your attention recently (what we would now probably call recency bias).

“While seeing the same celebrities popping up in ads always causes me to wonder whether they have a mortgage to pay off or a particularly expensive lawsuit to settle. But it does also make me wonder whether I’m just experiencing an episode of celebrity lumptitiousness.

“Given the (presumably finite) pool of personalities in the overlapping circles of ‘relevant to the target audience’ and ‘passes brand safety checks’, it’s no surprise that multiple brands request the hand of the same celebs.”

This ‘lumptitiousness’ isn’t a negative though, particularly if a celebrity has proven themselves popular across a wide target audience. Heather adds, “While accepted wisdom dictates brands need exclusive partnerships with celebrity ambassadors to build memory structures, not to mention seem authentic, we also know from ad testing that if creative has recently been in market, it will score more highly than new work that respondents aren’t familiar with. I wonder whether the same could be true of celebrities?

If your brand’s goal is to appear more relevant and capture attention, it may well be beneficial to participate in the groundswell surrounding the celebrity du jour, even if that celebrity’s moment in the sun extends beyond their day job. In fact, being a familiar face in ad spaces could even be a benefit: if your celebrity has partnerships with trusted brands that yours can borrow equity from, keeping company with that partnership may pay dividends. As well as for your celebrity’s new bathroom.”

Being the ‘celebrity du jour’ has certainly paid off for stars such as Claudia Winkleman and Alison Hammond, yet this pool of national treasures with broad appeal is not a large one, and it’s still crucial for brands to make sure their audience is engaged with their message.

​AJ Jones, McCann UK’s chief strategy officer, tells LBB, “There’s still a certain level of celebrity that has a rare uniting power in British culture. Just Eat’s recent campaign featuring Craig David tapped into this, partly because garage music is a great nostalgic unifier for audiences old enough to remember ‘What’s Your Flava?’ (and wealthy enough to be living in cities and spending healthy amounts on deliveries). And campaigns like Just Eat’s show that celeb partnerships work best when there’s a sense of natural engagement between the brand, their famous ambassadors, and their audiences.

“When brands can get the chemistry right, there’s big rewards. Think Helen Mirren championing ageless beauty with L’Oreal Paris. The problem is that our fragmented culture often leads us to different influential forces and there are now fewer ‘national icon’ celebrities, and significantly more influencers, for big brands to choose from. There are crossover celebrities, like Peter Crouch, who can tap into different elements of their fame to partner diverse household brands (Paddy Power and Ariel in Crouch’s case) but these celebs are few and far between. And picking a celeb because they’re popular, instead of adding them to enhance a robust creative idea, is not just a waste of money but risky for brands’ reputations.

“So the issue isn’t so much about brands in the same category circling the same celebrities, but rather brands targeting the same audiences with celebs as a shortcut to audience engagement.”

Victoria Velky, head of strategy at GAIN Creative Studios, adds, “I think the celebrities most in demand in UK advertising right now – the clear favourites – share a very specific set of ingredients. They arrive with their personality fully pre-installed, they’re culturally present rather than aspirationally distant, and they communicate emotional tone almost instantly. Take TV presenter Alison Hammond – currently fronting Specsavers’ ‘The Recruit’ home visits campaign, recently reprising her ‘Very Godmother’ role for The Very Group, and lending her voice to Wren Kitchens. She’s a textbook example. She functions less as an endorser than as an emotional airbag. Her presence reassures audiences that nothing too strange is about to happen and that the brand has passed some unspoken national audit of niceness. That clarity is one of the core ingredients brands are buying.

“I think that overexposure only becomes an issue when those ingredients are ignored – when a celebrity’s meaning is stretched across categories until it becomes harder to read. You could argue that happened briefly with Claudia Winkleman, who, within a relatively short window, was fronting Head & Shoulders, appearing in M&S ads, promoting Cannaray CBD, and popping up in National Lottery good causes. Each execution made sense in isolation, but collectively they pulled her persona in different directions – from functional to faintly surreal – which made it harder to know quite who she was meant to be at any given moment. (That said, her currency now is arguably at an all-time high, thanks to ‘The Traitors’ and an amazing fringe.) When the alignment is right, ubiquity doesn’t cheapen a famous face. It simply reflects the reality that in an age of low attention and low trust, recognisable, likeable humans remain one of the most effective brand ingredients available.”

So the key takeaways for brands: pick someone universally beloved who can communicate your message effectively and reassuringly without taking away from the product itself, and at all costs avoid what Social Chain’s Gareth Harrison calls ‘dilution of effectiveness’.

The strategy and innovation director explained, “Scale is diluted when celebrities are used as a shortcut to mass appeal. Chasing everyone means flattening meaning, and that broad reach often results in weakened relevance.

“Distinctiveness is diluted when celebrities become a shared asset. Brand managers would shudder at the thought of loaning out their logo, colours or sonic assets, but seem quite happy to share the same human shorthand.

“Salience is diluted when celebrity-first thinking replaces idea-first thinking. When the face becomes the idea, attention sticks to the person and not the brand.

“The solution is to build from communities out. Starting with real needs and behaviours of people. If a celebrity emerges from that, great, they amplify the meaning rather than replacing it. If not, you’ve still built something distinctive whilst creating a value exchange between people and the brand."

​Jon Howard, planning director and partner at Quiet Storm, adds, “The first time a celebrity is used in an unexpected way, it can be creatively impactful and genuinely brand-building. But too often now, celebrity casting feels like the last resort of lazy creativity - resulting in undifferentiated work where people can’t even remember who’s selling what.

“The sweet spot is simple: people are always more interested in their favourite celeb than your brand - so borrow attention with fame, but make the idea (and the takeaway) unmistakably and memorably about you, not them."