Brand heads in ads: CxOs who charmed with their screen presence

From boAt's Aman Gupta to Mama Earth's Varun and Ghazal Alagh, brand heads are becoming the face of their organizations by playing charming characters in adverts. Social Samosa takes a closer look.

Who says brand advertisements need celebrities, sportsmen and musicians to promote products? Now, we can see the brand heads from CEOs to CMOs playing a part in the product advertisements. 

While consumers don’t necessarily have to know someone to trust their recommendation, it’s always advantageous to make use of personal branding. And brand heads act as the vessel to build brands that resonate. 

The latest examples for brand honchos leading the endorsements include almost all of the Shark Tank India judges from Sugar Cosmetics to Lenskart and more. 

But this isn’t the first time for heads to get featured. Mahashian Di Hatti Private Limited (MDH) has created an impact amongst the consumers by consistently featuring its founder and CEO, Late Mr. Dharampal Gulati in every one of its advertisements. Similarly, International brands like Wendy’s and KFC have made their founders Late Dave Thomas and Late Colonel Harland Sanders the face of the brands respectively. 

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Celebrities endorsing brands can be effective, but brands have managed to create a sense of relatability by removing the ‘Star power’ with real people. Here’s a look at some of the brand campaigns featuring brand heads playing the endorsers. 

boAt - Aman Gupta

Earwear audio brand boAt’s co-founder Aman Gupta, has become more active in his brand’s marketing strategies ever since his popularity rose through his appearance in Shark Tank India. In December 2022, the brand partnered with Netflix to launch new wireless headphones in India. The campaign featuring celebrity Kiara Advani, also included an appearance from the Shark himself to add more value to the brand. Recently, it was reported that boAt’s sales have jumped over 2x to INR 2,872.9 Cr in 2022.

The Whole Truth - Shashank Mehta

Shashank Mehta, CEO of The Whole Truth relies on educational content to drive sales and establish trust amongst consumers. The head takes the lead in his ad campaigns and has consistently added a personalised touch to connect with the people.

SUGAR - Vineeta Singh

SUGAR Cosmetics’s advertisement, starring actors Ranveer Singh and Tamannaah Bhatia included the company’s CEO Vineeta Singh. The ad showcased the brand’s smudge proof and waterproof products by associating Singh with the brand itself. 

Oppo - Damyant Singh Khanoria

Damyant Singh Khanoria, Oppo India's Chief Marketing Officer (CMO), also starred in an ad for one of the brand’s phone models, a few months ago. To endorse the Oppo F21 Pro Series phones, the brand featured celebrity Varun Dhawan in the ad to celebrate Dhawan's birthday party and Khanoria can be seen, alongside other partygoers promoting the phone’s features.

Mama Earth - Varun & Ghazal Alagh

Mama Earth founders Varun and Ghazal Alagh have built a brand on trust and featured in their advertisement alongside their children to reflect the sincerity. The company became profitable in the year 2022 with a net profit of Rs. 14 crore.

Shaadi.com - Anupam Mittal

Anupam Mittal participated in his matchmaking brand Shaadi.com’s ad campaign donning a superhero avatar. The brand recently launched a periodic event called Shaadi Live, happening every 10 days, that gives eligible singles an opportunity to meet up to 10 potential matches over video calls, for 5 minutes each, within an hour. 

Lenskart - Peyush Bansal

Peyush Bansal's Lenskart campaign with Karan Johar has focused mainly on the elimination of middlemen when it comes to choosing affordable and classy eye wear. In a first, the brand has featured its head to showcase a humorous conversation to add in relatability. Bansal's popularity has grown ever since his appearance on Shark Tank and Lenskart's marketing strategies involved making him wear the brand's collection on the show.

Mi - Manu Kumar Jain

Manu Kumar Jain has routinely starred in Xiaomi’s subsidiary brand Redmi’s advertisements and got roped in a " target="_blank" rel="noopener" title="">promotional video for Amazon Prime Video’s original show Family Man. The former India Managing Director has since been promoted to a global role in the company as Group Vice President. 

Mint Mobile, Aviation Gin - Ryan Reynolds

Marketing maverick Ryan Reynolds is one of the most in-demand and influential creators in advertising because of his charming personality and his brand endorsements for his own brands reflect the same. He marketed his gin brand Aviation Gin well enough that it got sold for $610 mn. Recently, his featured advert for Mint Mobile written by AI chatbot, ChatGPT has been making the rounds on the internet.

Many brands have used employees and CxOs in their campaigns to humanize their brands. What do you think about this strategy? Let us know in the comments.