Chinese smartphones continue to bank on Indian celebrities

The trend of cashing in on the popularity of Indian celebrities to market smartphones is growing day-by-day, especially by Chinese players. Just days after Vivo’s sub-brand iQ00 roped in Indian cricket captain Virat Kohli as its brand ambassador to reach out to a bigger audience for its first product, its competitor Realme brought in actor Salman Khan to promote its smartphones. 

According to experts, this move has helped the phone makers to overcome the stigma associated with Chinese brands, but it is unlikely to bring big volumes.

“Chinese brands used Indian celebrities to enhance both recognition and recall. Use of these local faces made the brand feel more proximite, more familiar, taking away the negative overhang of being Chinese. It has been a clever strategy, well-executed. Sponsoring cricket and using Bollywood stars as ambassadors. Both ensured that what was deemed suspect and sub-standard ‘Chinese’ was bought without demur,” said Sandeep Goyal, chairman, Mogae Media. 

According to Faisal Kawoosa, founder and chief analyst, techARC, one of the biggest issues for the Chinese brands was to get more Indianised and appear global, and roping in famous faces from sports and cinema arena has helped them to achieve this.

However, the philosophy that brand ambassador will drive sales is not true, he adds.

“Last year when Realme roped in actor Ayushmann Khurrana, it witnessed a sharp fall in its quarterly sales. Consumers just don’t go by the face of the brand now, but by the specs and quality of the phones,” Kawoosa further said.

The emergence of digital platforms and hyper-local marketing (mainly by influencers on Instagram) is also pulling back smartphone sellers to depend entirely on one face to do all the branding for them. Experts are also sceptical that a face like Salman Khan, who doesn’t seem to be much into technology, would be able to influence new-age buyers.

However, for the company, it is just Salman Khan’s sheer popularity that matters the most. “Having Salman Khan on board with a mammoth fan following will help us reach and tap into that target audience for us,” said Madhav Sheth, VP, Realme.

On the appointment of Virat Kohli, Iqoo, director-marketing, Gagan Arora said, “As a brand, we want to appeal to young, energetic people who are determined to respond to any challenge with aplomb. Virat is the most seamless fit for our brand’s personality, and we are very pleased to have him being the face of iQOO.”