Psychological Impact of a Brand Mascot in Customer’s Purchase Decision

Psychological Impact of a Brand Mascot in Customer’s Purchase Decision

Deepak Kochhar, Pavitar Parkash Singh - 2019

The boom in social media marketing has also helped to increase the reach of brands in everyone’s pocket through a smart phone. Every age group is using smartphones and are well familiar with social media. Moreover, people are following bigger brands on these social media platforms which has led to transform the marketing strategies adopted by brands. Every company these days is busy in endorsing their product and services to be visually active and virtually as well incustomer’s mind. Daily posts on social media has helpedthe customer to be directly associated with the brand. These companies always share their message on social media through their own brand ambassador or brand mascot. So that is why mascots are easily recognized and are popular with customer of any age group.

So, it is the ability of the consumer to recognize the product having a particular brand identity. About the ability of children to relate the graphic signs to the product, Zuckerman and [1] in a study with children of 4 to10 years old, found that children have an amazing capability of perfectly relating the brand mascot to the specific product. As far as reminding of the different hints is concerned, according to [12] children of 2/7 years old focus on concrete clues, and from that age on, they develop the capacity of focusing on more motivations and more associated with the functionality of the products. Brand awareness is the most important factor which allows the consumer to choose the product from the other competitive products available in the market.



Brand mascots have been known to boost Facebook shares over non-character visual content, with the Charmin Bears increasing shares by 585% and Tony the Tiger increasing shares by 279%.

Analyzing the e ects of brand mascots on social media: Johnson City Power Board case study. Kristopher Caueld - 2012

However, building a strong brand is still necessary in developing lasting relationships with consumers even if it will not dramatically increase revenue. “People relate to the products they buy and the services they use, so branding is important”(Strother, 2010).

“Great brands always make an emotional connection with the intended audience...They reach beyond the purely rational and purely economic level to spark feelings of closeness, affection, and trust” (Berry, 2000).

Creating a brand character or mascot is a great way to build a corporate identity and to generate attention from the public. A mascot can give limitless opportunities to drive consumer interest and recognition. The design and implementation of the mascot is imperative to its success. “To be visually effective, the vehicles or mascots must be properly designed, satisfying both the viewer’s preferences and perceptions” (Lin, Lin & Ko, 1999).

The character should embody the spirit of the company and encapsulate the company’s missionand goals. The mascot must have symbolic color associations, a name with positive connotations, appealing associations, and convey a certain message to its consumers (Strother, 2010).

A recent failure was BurgerKing’s King. Although briefly popular, Burger King recently nixed the character because he was not appealing to customers and sales had been steadily dropping. A Burger King spokesman stated, "We did quite a bit of extensive research, and time and time again people said the differentiator that makes them love Burger King is the quality of our food...We are a food company, so we are going to take a food-centric marketing [approach]" (Gasparro, 2011).

Burger King created King, their mascot, as aggressive and bold with a large plastic head and a red velvet cape to appeal to men in their twenties. However, “recent commercials featuring the character gave off a slightly creepy vibe instead, with the royal rascal sneaking in to people's beds and peering through windows” (Gasparro, 2011).

elevision spots have shifted from being informative product messages, to inspiring messages meant to drive communication elsewhere. A number of companies have used television ads to spark initial interest in their characters to try and drive consumers to engage on the internet, wherethe characters can be fully developed. In creating a new M&M’s character, Mars Chocolate NorthAmerica developed a multimillion-dollar Super Bowl ad to introduce “Ms. Brown” to the public.However, promotion did not stop there. “Ms. Brown” held a live video chat with followers on Facebook and made a guest appearance on NBC’s “Celebrity Apprentice”. Ms. Brown even has her own musicchannel on Pandora internet radio (Schultz, 2012). Mars Chocolate North America sparked initial interest with a TV ad and then drove consumers to interact with their new character over several different platforms.

The influx of social media into the realm of marketing has provided a significant avenue for mascots to come alive. “Social media has made icons and mascots a much more interactive component of a brand’s story” (Shah, 2009). Facebook, currently, has over 845 million users worldwide, while Twitter has amassed over 500 million users (McNaughton, 2012). Social networks present a large population for consumer interaction. Many characters “communicate” to consumers through their respective social networking sites. “In many cases, consumers would rather interact online with a cute or cuddly character than with a faceless corporate executive ...It's easier to have a casual conversation”(Shah, 2009).

The recent influx of social media has provided utilities with a perfect vehicle for communicating a certain image with mascots. Social media is a place where mascots can come alive and personally interact with consumers.