SRK dominates brand recall during WC 2024 finals: IIHB survey

Delhi: According to a survey by Indian Institute of Human Brands (IIHB), Shahrukh ‘King’ Khan dominated the advertising recall on brand ambassadors on Saturday evening as India outclassed South Africa to bring home the World Cup, with Castrol, Everest Masalas, Denver and Vimal Pan Masala – though not necessarily in that order.

The Indian Institute of Human Brands (IIHB) ran a telephonic survey on Sunday morning for a Day-After-Recall (DAR) of the World Cup final match, reaching out to 478 respondents across India (M=262, F=216). Respondents were in the 18-40 age group.

Most recalled celebrity endorsers from the World Cup Final were:

1. Shahrukh Khan 82%

2. Virat Kohli 61%

3. Ajay Devgn 52%

4. MS Dhoni 49%

5. Sachin Tendulkar 32%

6. Tiger Shroff 23%

7. Alia Bhatt 19%

8. Ranveer Singh & Rahul Dravid 14%

9. Hrithik Roshan 13%

10. Amitabh Bachchan and Rohit Sharma 12% 

There was no discernable difference between male and female respondents.

The most recalled ad on the finals though was that of Birla Opus paints which did not have any celebrity endorser. In fact, the second most recalled brand, Parle, too did not feature any famous endorser.

Khan’s Vimal and Everest ads made it to the Top 5 on ad recall.

Carol Goyal, Executive Director of IIHB, under whose care the survey was conducted, said, “Advertising weight does matter. Khan easily had the highest amount of secondage amongst all celebrity endorsers on the World Cup telecast between the 4-5 brands that featured him. He dominated the ad breaks and was without doubt the most visible endorser on the finale.”

Sandeep Goyal, Chief Mentor of IIHB, added, “The most important take-away from this research is that King Khan is back – in fact back with a bang. Till not very far back it was Ranveer Singh and Virat Kohli that dominated the top slots as brand ambassadors. Shahrukh was not even in the reckoning, and most marketers had declared him a fading star. But he now seems a hot favourite with brands that have big budgets for a World Cup final.”

IIHB researchers also noticed an interesting halo effect in the study – Kohli’s most visible ad presence was through MRF Tyres which had a small sprinkling of short duration spots on the telecast. But his dominating presence on the field during the finals seemed to have upped his ad recall too.