Using Celebrity Candidates In Political Marketing Campaigns Andrew Hughes, The Australian National University Dr Stephen Dann, Queensland

University of Technology Abstract Celebrity candidature is a novel application of the celebrity endorsement practice to the field of political marketing. Modern politics is no stranger to the use of celebrities as spokespeople, endorsers and supports of causes, candidates and campaigns. This paper argues that the new high-water mark for celebrity endorsement of political marketing campaigns is the celebrity turned political candidate. Using the case of Peter Garrett (media celebrity, musician, political activist and ALP member for Kingsford Smith), the paper proposes a multipart model of celebrity political marketing for further investigation

Introduction The pre-selection by the Australian Labor Party (ALP) of Peter Garrett to run in the safe Labor House of Representatives seat of Kingsford Smith in Sydney creates a unique case opportunity for examining the conceptual issues surrounding the use of celebrity candidates in political marketing campaigns. The preselection of Peter Garrett marks a change in strategy by major political parties. Previous campaigners can be seen to have been often used by parties to win unwinnable seats, based less on the political platform of the party, and more on the personal appeal of the individual. However, Garret's successful preselection, and subsequent electoral victory, in the safe Labor seat presents the opportunity to use celebrity candidates to increase national awareness of the political brand amongst consumers

Literature Review There are three areas of literature review to be considered when discussing celebrity political campaigning. These include the nature of political marketing, source credibility and corporate credibility. Political Marketing To complicate the issue of studying celebrity endorsement in political marketing is the ongoing debate as to the existence of political marketing as a separate subcategory of marketing practice (Harris 2001, OShaughnessy 1990, OCass 1996). For the purposes of this paper, political marketing is defined as the adoption and adaptation of the techniques and philosophy of commercial marketing by political parties during electoral campaigns. Source Credibility The underlying theory behind the use of celebrities in marketing was first researched by Bergin (1962) who examine the role of the credibility of endorsers in ads. Subsequent research found more or less the same outcome with increasing levels of statistics and decreasing levels of relevance (Sternthal, Dholakia & Leavitt 1978; Harmon & Cooney 1982; Wu & Shaffer 1987; Moore, Hausknecht & Thamodaran 1988) The literature supports a broad generalization that perceived source credibility influences attitude and behavioural intentions towards products and brands. Higher levels of credibility will lead to an increased propensity to hold a favourable attitude and behavioural intention towards a product or brand endorsed

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by the celebrity. Lutz, MacKenzie & Belch (1983) and Lafferty, Goldsmith and Newell (2002) examined how all types of source credibility influenced advertising effectiveness, finding that that source credibility was an important antecedent to attitudes towards an advertisement and advertising effectiveness. DeSarbo & Harshman 1985; Ohanian (1990) found three main dimensions: expertise, trustworthiness and attractiveness. Corporate Credibility Goldberg & Hartwick (1990), Lafferty & Goldsmith (1999), Goldsmith et. al. (2000a, 2000b) and Lafferty, Goldsmith and Newell (2002) found that while organisation credibility had a moderate effect on attitudes towards the ad, there was a more noticeable effect on the attitude towards the brand. Consumers who perceive a company as credible are more likely to evaluate a firms advertisement favourably and to buy the companys products (Keller 1998, Lafferty, Goldsmith and Newell 2002). Lafferty, Goldsmith and Newell (2002), Goldsmith et. al. (2000a) also propose a causal link between corporate credibility and endorser credibility Assuming that the principles celebrity endorsement - expertise, trustworthiness, attractiveness - hold for celebrity endorsements in the political arena, these factors are also influenced by the corporate credibility of the political party. In effect, the party acts as an organisational endorser of the individual, thus influencing overall credibility of the candidate, whilst the celebrity is running as a candidate for an identified political party, Applying Celebrity Candidates to Political Marketing The application of celebrity candidates and celebrity endorsement to the political marketing environment has resulted in three distinct applications of the celebrity candidate concept which are examined briefly in the cases below. The first broad category is the "Leader as Celebrity Self Endorser", which occurs where the member of the political party attains a celebrity status, and then uses that celebrity status to endorse their own party. This is most commonly recognised through the media rebranding of political parties by their leader, eg Howard's Liberals (Federal), Beattie's Labor (QLD) and Goss's Labor (QLD). The second category relates to the celebrity candidate as a localised or regionalised self endorser of the political party. This occurs where the celebrity candidate is running for office under the strength of their personal reputation within the region, and is leveraging the corporate credibility of the political party endorsement to enhance their perceived political expertise. Finally, the third case is covers the category of the "Celebrity Candidate" where a recognised celebrity is endorsed as political candidate to stand for office. Prior Art: Use of High Profile Political Candidates Celebrity candidates have a longer history outside of the Australian political system. There is a long history of celebrity candidates running for elected office, ranging from movie stars in India and America. In the USA, high profile successes have included former wrestling star Jesse Ventura (Governor of Minnesota), Arnold Schwarzenegger (Governor of California), and Ronald Reagan (Governor of California, US President, 1984-1992) Keeping the Home Admirers Yearning: Australian High Profile Candidates In the Australian political context, there has been a relative short history of celebrity candidates. Most notably, there are instances in Victorian State Political level such as aerial skier Kirstie Marshall (ALP, Victoria) former AFL footballer Justin Madden (ALP, Victoria), former cyclist the late Sir Hubert Opperman (Liberal, Victoria). However, to date, the highest profile success case has been Peter Garrett (ALP, Sydney).

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Case 1: Leader as Celebrity Self Endorser Political parties have observed how party leaders become celebrities in their own right, and who are then able to act as endorsers of their own brand of political product. Tony Blair was used by the English Labour Party to be both the endorser and the brand for New Labour (Lees-Marshment 2002). The impact of this upon voters though has not been thoroughly investigated. However, based on opinion poll results such as Newspoll, voters are using these leaders as another point of differentiation between products. Where the products are closely linked to the personality of the celebrity, consumers are able to see a clear differentiation between brands (Hsu & McDonald 2002). Political theorists have implicitly recognised this in their research where they have described the Australian Democrats political survival being based around having a leader with a strong public profile (Warhurst 1997). The Australian Greens rise to electoral success being largely due to the profile of its leader, Senator Bob Brown, and the most notorious example of this theory was the rise (and fall) of "The Pauline Hanson One Nation Party" that was built around the personality and profile of its leader, Pauline Hanson (Dann & Dann, 1998). Hanson was used by the party as not only the endorser of the brand, but also as a product in her own right. Marketers need to understand how and why this can successfully occur so as to understand how consumers behave to such brands. This is important for marketers, as these types of brands are not just restricted to political marketing either; Richard Branson is both a celebrity and a product to consumers, as is Australias own Gerry Harvey, who has also become both a celebrity and a branded product. In entertainment, the same people that are in fact that product, such as musical bands or movie stars, act as the endorsers for the very products that they are. Prominent researchers (Ehrenberg & Goodhardt 2002), have stressed the importance of understanding how brands are influenced in non-traditional categories as this will assist researchers overall understanding of brand behaviour. So by being able to understand how consumers are influenced by celebrities that become both the endorser and the brand in a political marketing environment will be important in understanding the overall impact of celebrities on brands.

Case 2: Celebrity Candidates as Regional Endorser: The Victorian Case In Victoria, celebrity candidates were used by as endorsers for the political brand in a context specific application by endorsing the party in their local regional electorate. Table 1: Celebrity Candidates in recent Australian Political Marketing Campaigns. Candidate Year Pre Election Margin Swing To Candidate Swing to Party Justin Madden 1998 7.82% 7.78% 2.04% (ALP- Vic) Patrick Farmer 2001 -1.69% 10.67% 3.19% (Lib Fed) Kirstie Marshall 2002 -5.86% 12.98% 4.79% (ALP Vic) Source: Australian Electoral Commission, Victorian Electoral Commission

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The candidates in this table were chosen primarily as candidates where they would have had a high degree of source credibility with voters in the chosen electorate. As can be seen from the table, this strategy maximised the benefit to the brand as in all cases the candidate won their seat. The localisation effect also allows researchers to identify the factors behind these candidates winning their election. Whilst there are many factors that influence general election outcomes, it is interesting to note that in all cases in Table 1, the party of the celebrity also won government. Another note of interest is that the choice of celebrity has also dictated at which level of government the candidate has been nominated for. For instance Peter Garrett has always been associated with Federal political campaigns, whereas a candidate such as Justin Madden has only run so far for Victorian State electorates. These results support the theory that political parties were using these candidates as a commercial organisation would; that is an endorser of a product. The fact that they were elected to parliament assisted in the party or the brand they were endorsing then becoming the dominant one in the marketplace. More importantly, voters willingness to accept these candidates in an area where they previously had no credibility is also worthy of interest from a marketing point of view. Celebrity candidates have tended to be most effective in marginal electorates. By analogy with existing celebrity endorsement theory it can be seen that celebrity candidates were most effective in a market where differentiation between the parties was most needed. In instances where political parties, such as the ALP and the Liberal Party, were seen to be undifferentiated by voters, election results tend to favour the celebrity candidates, who were able to use their credibility with the target market as a point of differentiation between themselves and other candidates. What is interesting though from a marketing perspective and what needs to be understood is why the use of celebrity candidates as endorsers of political brands has only localised effects. For instance, why have many celebrity candidates achieved swings towards them that are in most cases triple that of the party they were running for as a whole. Where celebrities have been used as only endorsers, and not candidates, their impact has been less noticeable and has been less of a point of differentiation for voters. Case Study 3: Celebrity as Candidate Peter Garrett What makes the Peter Garrett celebrity endorsement case unique is that he is the first major political celebrity to run as an endorsed candidate for a political party in which he has shown little to no interest. Peter Garretts political past would still be in the minds of many consumers in New South Wales, as in 1984 he came within 1500 votes (on preferences) of being elected to the Senate for the Nuclear Disarmament Party. Since 1984, he has been active in the environmental movement, being involved in senior positions for both Greenpeace and the Australian Conservation Foundation. Thus, for many consumers there would be a degree of dissonance associated with his decision to be both an endorser and a candidate for the ALP. The decision to preselect Peter Garrett is also interesting to examine in the context of how political parties use celebrity candidates as a method of rebranding. For many years, there has been a strong link between a political brand image, and the brand communities that loyally buy only one type of political product based upon their characteristics.

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The seat of Kingsford Smith, a traditionally strong working class electorate that has been held by the ALP for many years, lacked a clear schema match. Garrett's perceived schema as a conservationist, radical and high profile activist would not represent an immediate match for the constituents of Kingsford Smith. Schema mismatch theory indicates that in the presence of a moderate incongruity, or a partial match, this increases the amount of thought the individual puts into assessing the sponsorship message (Rifon et al 2004). Research on the effects of multiple brand endorsements (Hsu & McDonald 2002) suggests that Peter Garretts past involvement with other brands will have the effect of confusing consumers. For those who have become loyal to the ALP brand due to their association with a certain brand community, the Engel Kollat Blackwell (1986) model of consumer decision making suggests that perhaps these consumers might be experiencing dissonance over this decision. Consumers loyal to Peter Garrett and his conservation beliefs will also find it difficult to overcome their dissonance that they now must be experiencing to change their purchase habits to now buy his new product and beliefs. Given his electoral success, it is possible to speculate that the mismatched endorsement resulted in a stronger affirmative schema, when voters considered Garrett's political record (standing for the NDP), activist record (Greenpeace), and credibility as political candidate (strong track record of political activity)

Conclusion and Contribution The first contribution of the paper is to the continue the development of literature governing the adaptation of commercial marketing into the political context. This paper assists by developing the field of research concerning the marketing techniques are being applied by political organisations through the examination of the use of the principles of celebrity endorsement for political candidates Many in the community have suggested that the use of celebrity candidates such as Peter Garrett will become the norm for political marketing campaigns. However, the past and present use of celebrity candidates has shown that if anything the use of celebrity candidates will need to remain selective and consistent with the celebritys image for this to be effective as a branding technique in future campaigns. Results from elections also suggest that the concept of celebrity endorsement can be successfully transferred to politics. Globally, voters as consumers have responded similarly to a celebrity in a political marketing campaign as they would one in a commercial campaign, as long as the necessary pre-conditions of fit as mentioned by researchers such as Hsu and McDonald (2002) exist. This would then indicate that if this were the case, then the argument for the existence of political marketing would further be supported. Whilst some commercial brands, such as Nike, use the same endorser for many years with success, whether or not political brands can do the same thing with a celebrity who then becomes part of the brand itself will be the subject of future research into this area. It is also unknown at what point do consumers start to evaluate the celebrity more on their political performance, and less on their celebrity attributes. Future research could also investigate how quickly do consumers develop dissonance towards a celebrity candidate and how they express this and also how long does it take before the source credibility of the celebrity changes from what they were known for to what they now do, and then for their credibility or image to reflect this change.

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