Mostly I argue that people are not brands. But in Tiger Woods’ case I make an exception. Because he has gone out of his way to make himself one, and he’s been taking everyone for a fool.
When Tiger Woods made a statement apologising for “not being true to my values” he revealed the depth of his fraud. Just how ‘true’ are those ‘values’, Tiger? Given the extent to which he is now known to have flaunted them, clearly they are not true at all. Tiger, your values are the things that define your behaviour, not the things you think sponsors want to hear. You can’t just say them, you have to live them. If you are consistently doing bad things then you have bad values. Simple as that. When you’re aware of your actions (he wasn’t sleepwalking) to claim your values as anything else is just yet another lie.
Harsh? No. Prior to the scandal in 2001, Enron’s publicly stated values were “communication, respect, integrity, and excellence”. When their deception became apparent their Directors went to jail and corporate accounting practices were changed forever. That’s what can happen when you lie about your values. You might argue that Enron, as a big business, is different. Except that it isn’t. Tiger Woods career earning surpassed the $1 billion mark earlier this year – that’s big business enough. The vast majority of that $1bn is made from sponsorship deals and the size and scope of those deals is, in part at least, based on those same ‘values’ that Tiger claimed to have, but didn’t. The deals get renewed and extended because the public respect Woods for the values he appears to project. Which we now know are a con. Of course in Tiger’s case, he hasn’t broken any laws (apart from a minor traffic offence) so he’s not going to jail. But it’s a form of branded deception nonetheless.
But in the short term, at least, Woods may survive this. His sponsors may be too timid to drop him. But his ‘values’ will be forever changed. If he continues to claim the lie then his appeal to the public and to sponsors will spiral downwards and his longer-term propects are certainly less good. Although were he to be honest at this point and declare his values for that they really are, then perhaps he could even end up prospering even more.
After all, it turns out he’s way more fun than we thought.
Strange. Regardless of brand values, blah blah blah, Tiger Woods is still the world’s best golfer, irrelevant to the fact about his behaviour away from the golf course. This will not stop him competing and winning in tournaments, and as a result, the ‘brand values’ will go rolling on. How did the David Beckham affair scandals effect his footing as a world sporting icon? Zilch. What has happened might make some people think less of him, but in my opinion that’s irrelevant, the man can still do things with a golf ball that others can’t do, so will continue to set the bar.
Interesting points by both Jim and Steve here. We talk a lot about values in branding but if a brand continues to perform its service well or make its product to the quality we expect, the public seem to be quite forgiving about a lapse or lie in its values (as Steve points out).
With Enron, surely the performance of their company “service” was a lie as well as their values? But in Tiger’s case I imagine his brand will remain intact if he continues to perform his “service” well (i.e top class pro golf) – as was the case with Beckham.
I’m not 100% convinced by this article – here’s my thinking:
Tiger Woods is a brand. Part of his brand value is as a clean living all American family man. However when he failed to live up to this ideal he didn’t loose people their jobs, their pensions and otherwise defraud thousands of investors across the international stock markets… he didn’t sign a formal contract of behaviour with his audience…. so the ENRON analogy is quite a leap. At this level there is no such thing as a “timid” sponsor – only sponsors tied into contracts. If they want to drop him, and they legally or financially can, then they will. My guess is that they won’t because most big companies who use Tiger Woods to endorse their products, like their customers, are quite smart and media aware. They understand that he is a human being first and a brand second. They might want to read the gory details in the tabloids but they are unlikely to care in any real sense. The only people legitimately entitled to criticise Woods for “branded deception” are his wife and kids.
Still a brand, and now the brand values have changed which require a “re-branding.”
It will be difficult to run television spots having kids saying “I am Tiger Woods.”