Leveraging celebrities with inconsistent attractiveness and credibility for charitable endorsement: A cue diagnosticity perspective

Building upon the cue diagnosticity framework, this research investigates the influence of three categories of celebrities (attractive-credible, attractiveness-oriented, and credibility-oriented) on charitable endorsements. We generated 1095 participants’ data from three studies via an online experimental design and conducted analysis using ANOVA. Study 1 demonstrated that the attractive-credible celebrity outperforms the credibility-oriented and attractiveness-oriented celebrities in persuasion. Study 2 discovered that attractive-oriented celebrities are more effective for emotional ad apppeals, whereas credibility-oriented celebrities excel in informational ad appeals. Study 3 found that attractiveness-oriented celebrities align well with high non-profit organization images, whereas credibility-oriented celebrities are more effective with low and medium non-profit organization images. The current research incorporates the cue diagnosticity framework in celebrity characteristics literature and guides managers on leveraging celebrities with inconsistent attractiveness and credibility characteristics.