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Belch: Advertising and
Promotion, Sixth Edition
IMC PERSPECTIVE 6-3
178
III. Analyzing the
Communication Process
6. Source, Message, and
Channel Factors
Using Q Scores and the Fame Index
to Help Choose a Celebrity Endorser
Obviously many marketers believe strongly in the
value of celebrity spokespeople, as the amount of
money paid to them continues to soar to record levels.
Companies look for a celebrity who will attract viewers’
attention and enhance the image of the company or
brand. But how do they choose the right one? While
some executives rely on their own intuition and gut
feeling, many turn to research that measures a
celebrity’s appeal as well as other factors that will provide
insight into his or her warmth, trust, and credibility
among the target audience.
To help select a celebrity endorser, many companies
and their advertising agencies rely on Q ratings that
are commercially available from the New York–based
firm known as Marketing Evaluations/TVQ, Inc. To
determine its Performer Q ratings for TV and movie
personalities, the company surveys a representative
national panel of 1,800 people twice a year and asks
them to evaluate over 1,500 performers. For its Sports
Q rating, which is conducted once a year, the company
surveys 2,000 teens and adults and asks them about
approximately 500 active and retired players, coaches,
managers, and sportscasters. In both studies respondents
are asked to indicate whether they have ever
seen or heard of the performer or sports personality
and, if they have, to rate him or her on a scale that
includes “one of my favorites,” “very good,” “good,”
“fair,” or “poor.” The familiarity score indicates the
percentage of people who have heard of the person,
while the one-of-my-favorite score is an absolute measure
of the appeal or popularity of the celebrity. The
well-known Q rating is calculated by taking the percentage
of respondents who indicate that a person is
© The McGraw−Hill
Companies, 2003
“one of my favorites” and dividing that number by the
percentage of respondents who indicate that they
have heard of that person. The Q score thus answers
the question “How appealing is the person among
those who do know him or her?”
Results from a 2002 Performer Q study found that
Tom Hanks was familiar to 92 percent of those surveyed
and was considered “one of my favorites” by 48
percent. Thus, his Q rating was 52 (48/92) which was the
highest score among all performers measured. Other
performers in the top 10 along with their Q ratings
included Bill Cosby (50), Mel Gibson (47), Harrison Ford
(45), Sean Connery (45), Denzel Washington (42), Robert
DeNiro (41), Michael J. Fox (40), and Will Peterson (30).
The 2002 Sports Q survey for active and retired athletes,
coaches, managers, and sportscasters showed
that Michael Jordan was familiar to 90 percent of those
surveyed and considered “one of my favorites” by 47
percent, for a leading Q rating of 52. Other sports personalities
in the top 10 included Tiger Woods (43),
Nolan Ryan (40), Cal Ripken Jr. (39), Joe Montana (39),
Wayne Gretzky (37), Jerry Rice (36), Sarah Hughes (36),
Jackie Joyner-Kersey (36), and John Madden (35). The
average Q score is generally around 18 for performers
and 17 for sports personalities. Marketing Evaluation’s
Q ratings are also broken down on the basis of various
demographic criteria such as a respondent’s age,
income, occupation, education, and race so that marketers
have some idea of how a celebrity’s popularity
varies among different groups of consumers.
In addition to using Q ratings, marketers are using
information provided by other firms to match celebrities
with their products. Hollywood–Madison Avenue
Group, a firm that arranges celebrity endorsements,
has poured over 10 years of research into its Fame
Index, which is a database listing more than 10,000
celebrities by 250 criteria such as age, sex, residence,
career highlights, charity affiliations, fears, interests,
and addictions. The database is updated daily with
information from the Internet, magazines, and newspaper
articles as well as television. Information in the
Fame Index reveals that actors Tom Cruise, Jim
Belushi, and Jason Alexander are big hockey fans, while
Carol Burnett and Rosie O’Donnell collect dolls. Kirstie
Alley’s interests include Scientology, the environment,
and motorcycles, and she supports charities concerned
with AIDS, children’s welfare, and animal rights.
Hollywood-Madison has helped a number of companies
choose celebrities to serve as their advertising
spokespersons. For example, Philips Consumer Elec-