THE PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY SCHREYER HONORS COLLEGE DEPARTMENT OF MARKETING Celebrities Personal Brand Analysis TOREY JOSOWITZ SPRING 2021 A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for a baccalaureate degree in Marketing with honors in Marketing Reviewed and approved* by the following: Jennifer Chang Coupland Paiste Fellow in Teaching and Learning Clinical Professor of Marketing Honors Advisor and Thesis Supervisor Eunice Kim Assistant Professor of Marketing Faculty Reader * Electronic approvals are on file. i ABSTRACT The objective of this analysis is to identify how public figures protect their personal brands throughout their social media platforms. While current events occur in the United States such as the COVID-19 Pandemic, Black Lives Matter Movement, and the 2020 Election, it is crucial to analyze how celebrities evolve or do not evolve their social media platforms to protect their brand name while still maintaining a large following. To help with identifying how celebrities share their brand personality through social media, I decided to analyze Jennifer Aaker’s 5 Dimensions of brand personality and explain how the dimensions correlate with different celebrities. I found that by giving each public figure a different dimension of Aaker’s brand personalities, it identified whether or not they would change or adjust their posts when different current events happened. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES ..................................................................................................... iii LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................................... iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................................... v Chapter 1: Introduction ......................................................................................... 1 Chapter 2 Introducing Aaker’s 5 Dimensions of Brand Personality and Goffman’s Human Behavior ................................................................................................... 5 Sophistication ....................................................................................................... 7 Ruggedness ........................................................................................................... 9 Competence .......................................................................................................... 11 Excitement ............................................................................................................ 13 Sincerity ................................................................................................................ 16 Erving Goffman’s Theory on Human Behavior ................................................... 18 Chapter 3 Combining Aaker’s and Goffman’s Theories with Celebrities ................... 19 Sophistication: Kylie Jenner ................................................................................. 20 Ruggedness: Lea DeLaria ..................................................................................... 26 Competence: Taylor Swift .................................................................................... 29 Excitement: Lady Gaga ........................................................................................ 35 Sincerity: Selena Gomez ....................................................................................... 40 Chapter 4 Real People vs. Brands ................................................................................ 45 Chapter 5 Conclusion ................................................................................................... 48 Bibliography ................................................................................................................ 49 iii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Influencer Pyramid ....................................................................................... 3 Figure 2: Tiffany & Co. Boxes .................................................................................... 8 Figure 3: Otterbox Advertisement ............................................................................... 10 Figure 4: Bank of America Logo Figure 5: Chase Bank Logo .... 12 Figure 6: Apple Logo History ...................................................................................... 13 Figure 7: Nike Logo ..................................................................................................... 14 Figure 8: Tesla Logo .................................................................................................... 15 Figure 9: Hallmark Logo ............................................................................................. 16 Figure 10: Hallmark Vision Statement ........................................................................ 17 Figure 11: Jenner Halloween 2020 Figure 12: Jenner July 2020.......... 21 Figure 13: Jenner's Instagram Figure 14: KylieCosmetics Homepage 22 Figure 15: Jenner Audience Demographics ................................................................. 24 Figure 16: DeLaria Instagram Posts ............................................................................ 26 Figure 17: DeLaria Trump Post ................................................................................... 28 Figure 18: Swift's Instagram Page ............................................................................... 29 Figure 19: Swift's Instagram (Lover) .............................................................................................................................. Figur e 20: Swift's Instagram (Folklore/Evermore) ....................................................... 31 Figure 21: Swift Follower Demographics.................................................................... 33 Figure 22: Gaga's Instagram Content ........................................................................... 36 Figure 23: Gaga MTV Awards 2020 ........................................................................... 37 Figure 24: Gaga #ServeThePolls Campaign ................................................................ 38 Figure 25: Gomez Body Confidence Photo ................................................................. 41 Figure 26: Gomez Juneteenth Post .............................................................................. 42 Figure 27: Gomez Rare Beauty Post ............................................................................ 43 iv Figure 28: Gomez Follower Demographics ................................................................. 44 v LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Aaker’s Brand Personality Framework ......................................................... 6 vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my honors advisor and thesis supervisor, Dr. Jennifer Chang Coupland. She has always been a great resource and has offered her assistance whenever she could. Without her, I would not have had a final thesis topic, she was able to help me formulate the topic to what it is today. I appreciate her kindness, patience, and understanding throughout the whole process. I would also like to thank my mom who has helped me every step of the way throughout the thesis process. She has constantly checked my work and was available whenever I needed to bounce ideas off of her. 1 Chapter 1: Introduction Before the creation of social media, fans would follow along with magazines, television and tabloids to find out the latest news about their favorite celebrities. The most popular celebrities would receive thousands of fan mail each day. With this new era of digital media and public platforms, a virtual space has been created for public figures to interact directly with their followers. Not only has social media provided celebrities with a public space to post whenever and whatever they want, it has also allowed them to enhance their brand personalities. Brand personality is defined as “the set of human characteristics associated with a brand” (Aaker). This could be like feeling a sense of happiness and nostalgia when seeing the Disney logo or how the John Deere logo gives an outdoorsy and masculine feeling. Although brand personality is used to humanize businesses and organizations, it can also be used to help celebrities stand out in the public eye. Celebrities are in the public eye constantly. They have even created reality TV shows that follow their lives. According to The Daily American, “reality television has become a household commodity in just a few short years, and there are many reasons that contribute to the raise in popularity”(Phillippi). People watch Reality TV for mindless entertainment. They do need to necessarily watch each episode but they enjoy seeing real life situations. Some popular examples are Keeping up with the Kardashians and The Bachelor. They can millions of viewers each week because “people like to watch others who are successful”(Phillippi). Following the Kardashian family in both their reality show and social media platforms is what sparked my thesis idea in the 2 hopes to find out how they are able to continue to stay relevant to their followers through social media when compared to other celebrities and influential figures. The biggest question that arises when comparing celebrities' Instagram pages is how could Kylie Jenner and Selena Gomez both have over 200 million followers on Instagram when they both post completely different content? With celebrities gaining access to social media it has formed a new segment of marketing