Original Article

A political candidate’s brand image

scale: Are political candidates
brands?
Received (in revised form): 14th April 2009

Francisco Guzmán
is an assistant professor of marketing at the University of North Texas. His research focuses on branding, corporate
social responsibility and new product development. He is a visiting professor both at ESADE in Barcelona and Monterrey
Tec in Mexico.

Vicenta Sierra
is an associate professor in the Quantitative Methods Department at ESADE in Barcelona. Her research focuses on
robust statistics, statistical simulation and psychometrics.

ABSTRACT This study analyses the brand image of presidential candidates for
Mexico’s 2006 election. Respondents from a nationwide random probabilistic sample
of Mexico’s voting population were asked to evaluate the personality – brand image – of
the three principal political candidates based on 58 selected traits that result from
combining Aaker’s brand personality and Caprara et al’s candidate personality
frameworks. Data were analysed using Principal Component Analysis and Structural
Equation Modeling procedures. The resulting brand image framework for Mexico’s
2006 presidential candidates was represented by five factors (competence, empathy,
openness, agreeableness and handsomeness). As the resulting framework explains
which elements of a candidate’s brand image are taken into consideration when
making an electoral decision, it has a practical application for future political
campaigns. It also provides a conceptual platform for viewing political candidates
as brands.
Journal of Brand Management (2009) 17, 207–217. doi:10.1057/bm.2009.19;
published online 25 September 2009

Keywords: brand personality; candidate personality; candidates’ brand image;

factor analysis

Correspondence:
Francisco Guzmán
University of North Texas,
INTRODUCTION dollars were spent on the US midterm
Department of Marketing and
Logistics, College of Business,
Multi-million dollar electoral campaigns are election and $1 billion dollars were budg-
University of North Texas,
PO Box 311396, Denton,
run every year all around the world. eted for Mexico’s presidential election.
TX 76203-1396, USA According to the Progressive Policy Institute, These amounts represent an election cost
E-mail: Francisco.Guzman@
unt.edu during 2006 an estimated US$2.6 billion per registered voter of $18.30 and $25

© 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 3, 207–217

www.palgrave-journals.com/bm/
 Guzmán and Sierra
respectively, compared to a cost of $2.60
in Britain, $4 in Spain and $14 in Australia.
The cost of the 2008 US election for
President and Congress was even higher.
The Center for Responsive Politics has
estimated a total cost of $5.3 billion dollars;
– $2.4 billion dollars alone for the presi-
dential race. Electoral costs vary country by
country depending not only on specific
public budgets assigned to election manage-
ment bodies, but also on other direct and
indirect financial outlays – such as subsi-
dised services and assistance programmes –
and the country’s level of risk and lack of
security due to its political environment.1
The implications of the cost of elections
are important for the development of a
country, as the electoral machinery can
generate economic and social wealth
through employment generation, the con-
sumption of services and the election of a
particular candidate with a specific eco-
nomic and social agenda that ultimately
affects the entire products and services
market.
It was not until 1956 that a US presi-
dential candidate, Dwight Eisenhower,
used television to advertise his campaign.2
Since then, political campaigns have tran-
sitioned from relying more on grassroots
efforts to adopting a marketing orienta-
tion,3 and advertising has become an essen-
tial element of campaign communication
strategies.4 Within today’s mass communi-
cated election environments, image has
gained weight over policies, and a consid-
erable percentage of the cost of elections
comes from the candidates’ marketing cam-
paigns. More than $620 million were spent
on political advertising for the US election
in 2004, compared to the $360 million that
Anheuser-Busch spent on the same year.5
TNS Media Intelligence estimated that
close to $1.7 billion were spent in political
advertising in the United States during
2006 and more than $2 billion were spent
during 2008. With so much money behind
208 © 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management
electoral campaigns, the question this
research sets out to answer is that of whether
or not a political candidate can be consid-
ered a brand.
The reason this question is relevant is
that traditional political marketing theory
has commonly debated whether political
candidates can be viewed as products while
political parties can be understood as
brands.3,6,7 The logic behind this reasoning
is that voters, who generally use cognitively
efficient strategies for coding mass amounts
of complex data to create shortcuts that
help them decide how to vote,6,8–10 view
political parties as brands in order to sim-
plify their decision making. We believe,
however, that this perspective has become
outdated, and that voters’ simplification
processes have shifted focus from the parties
to the candidates. While a political party is
an important brand attribute, a candidate,
above his or her own ideology or party
affiliation, has become a brand – a brand
that voters follow. A brand that has its own
traits and values and, like any other brand,
fights for a space in consumers’ minds.
A brand that has an image built around
three pillars – the physical attributes of the
candidate, the candidate’s personality and
the benefits the candidate promises to the
electorate.
An exhaustive literature review has found
very limited research that investigates can-
didates as brands. However, during the past
couple of years many political and mar-
keting analysts have referred to political
candidates as brands in the popular press
and the blogosphere. For example, News-
week, Fast Company and Politico recently
published articles about the Obama
‘brand’,11–13 while positioning guru Al
Ries, wrote a day after the US presidential
election that 4 November 2008 ‘will go
down in history as the biggest day in mar-
keting history’.14 Therefore, the objective
of this paper is to take a first step towards
addressing the aforementioned research
Vol. 17, 3, 207–217

question – can a political candidate be con-
sidered a brand? – by using Aaker’s15 brand
personality and Caprara et al ’s16 candidate
personality scales to analyse the brand image
of the presidential candidates in Mexico
during the 2006 election. To accomplish
this objective, we use data from a nation-
wide research study and perform a Principal
Component and Confirmatory Factor
Analysis to build a political candidate brand
image scale. In the following section, we
present the conceptual framework and
research proposition. The method section
is presented next. We then present our
findings. We conclude with a discussion of
the findings, managerial implications and
limitations of this study.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Presidential campaigns are paying more
attention to the development of candidate
trait images, given that the candidate’s image
is critical to electoral success.17 Although
some voters base their decision on policy
issues and ideology,18,19 most voters gener-
ally create shortcuts that help them decide
how to vote.6,8–10 On some occasions,
voters simply do not care about the policies.
On others, the supported policies are dif-
ficult to understand or are not clearly
expressed by the candidate. Thus, they defer
to evaluating a candidate based on his/her
image, as a decision-making shortcut.
Focusing on personal characteristics allows
voters to infer how the candidate will act
in office. In fact, several authors16,20–23 claim
that perceptions of candidates and voting
intentions are more commonly focused on
personality characteristics and image, rather
than on policy concerns or partisan affilia-
tion. As a consequence, the media spends
more time focusing its attention on the can-
didates’ personalities than on reporting their
positions on policy issues.20
Although not commonly discussed in
academic literature, the idea of analysing
political candidates as brands is not new.
© 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management
A political candidate’s brand image scale
Nakanishi et al 24 conceptualise candidates
as brands when trying to predict voting
behaviour. Smith25 argues that both polit-
ical parties and politicians can be viewed as
brands. For example, we saw President
George Bush brand himself as ‘W’,26 while
more recently we have heard about the
Sarkozy and the Obama brands. Like any
other brand, political candidates rely on
various communication tools to build their
own brand image, from traditional adver-
tising and grassroots efforts (travelling
around their circumscription in order to
meet people face-to-face) to more innova-
tive tools, such as web pages, blogs, social
networking sites and e-mail.
In the more traditional political adver-
tising arena, much emphasis has been placed
on negative comparative political adver-
tising as a common campaign tactic. Neg-
ative political advertising campaigns appear
to have a negative effect on targeted-can-
didate evaluations.27 The negativity effect,
however, is significant only in judgements
of candidates that a voter dislikes, and a
negative attack advertisement is not more
likely than a positive advertisement to
change undecided voters’ opinions.28 Pure
attacks are now generally avoided in favour
of communicating negative information
about a particular opponent. Political mar-
keting around the world has been influ-
enced by the effectiveness of American
practices, and as a consequence the use of
negative political advertising appears to be
increasing in countries other than the
United States.29 During the 2006 Mexican
presidential election, this was particularly
evident, and relatively new to the Mexican
political scene. During the last few months
of the presidential race, the National Action
Party launched a campaign against Andrés
Manuel López Obrador stating that he was
a danger for the country, and independent
opinion groups launched a similar parallel
campaign. The dramatic turnaround in the
electoral preferences during these final
Vol. 17, 3, 207–217 209
 Guzmán and Sierra
weeks could well have been influenced by
the effectiveness of this campaign.
Regarding more innovative communi-
cation methods, campaign strategists have
recently learned that the use of Internet-
based communication tools provides oppor-
tunities for the candidate to connect in a
more personal and interactive way with
potential voters.30 Internet campaigning
helps a candidate to strengthen grassroots
efforts by enabling a constant bidirectional
flow of information with potential voters.
This new dimension of interactivity in the
candidate’s communication efforts allows
for the development of an experiential
brand and, as we saw during the US Pres-
idential election, an effective use of dif-
ferent communication tools can have a
powerful effect on the perceived brand
image of the candidate.
Despite the fact that campaign strategists
are using all of these branding tools to
market their political candidates, to our
knowledge, no existing research has ana-
lysed political candidates as brands. As a first
step towards formalising this concept, we
propose measuring the brand image of
political candidates by using brand person-
ality and candidate personality scales.
BRAND PERSONALITY AS A
MEASURE OF BRAND IMAGE
During the last decade, within the branding
literature, the construct of brand personality
has been increasingly discussed. The per-
sonification of a brand has gained strategic
importance given the positive effect it can
have over its positioning. Brands are per-
ceived by consumers to have a certain per-
sonality that can signify a set of benefits and
values. Aaker15 (p. 347) defines brand per-
sonality as ‘the set of human characteristics
associated with a brand.’ She develops a
scale for measuring brand personality,
drawing on the ‘Big Five’ dimensions from
personality psychology research.
210 © 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management
The Big Five personality factors of extro-
version, agreeableness, conscientiousness,
emotional stability and openness are the
result of factor analyses among thousands
of adjectives that describe personality
attributes in different languages,31 and have
been shown to offer a consensual frame-
work to adequately describe human per-
sonality.32 The Big Five structure has
been used previously to analyse political
candidates’ personalities.16,33 Furthermore,
describing a brand with adjectives the same
way individuals are described in psychology
is considered to be an interesting and rel-
evant method for identifying the character-
istics of brands’ personalities according to
consumer perception.31,34
Aaker’s brand personality scale has been
reviewed and questioned by several authors.
The principal criticism it has received
involves its generalisability.31,35–39 How-
ever, controversy has also arisen regarding
the domain of the construct itself. Azoulay
and Kapferer 34 claim that Aaker’s definition
of brand personality is too general and
embraces concepts beyond brand person-
ality, and that as a consequence, her scale
does not measure brand personality but
rather more than one dimension of a brand.
According to Plummer,40 the brand per-
sonality or characterisation of a brand is
only one of three components of brand
image, together with the physical elements –
brand attributes – and the functional char-
acteristics – brand benefits. Keller41 also
mentions that brand personality attributes
are part of the multiple brand associations
that configure a brand image. Likewise,
Kapferer42 argues that brand personality is
only one of the six elements that constitute
the brand identity prism, together with
physique, culture, relation, reflection and
state of mind.
As Aaker’s brand personality scale
includes physical aspects as well as intel-
lectual, gender and social class attributes
that go beyond personality, we consider
Vol. 17, 3, 207–217
 A political candidate’s brand image scale

it to be, in agreement with Azoulay and As mentioned above, in order to develop

Kapferer 34 and Davies et al,43 an appro-
priate measurement for brand image. In
addition, in search of a more universal scale,
we included some traits from the Five
Factor Model of personality. According to
Harris and Fleming,44 there is much to gain
by supplementing brand personality traits
with human personality traits. Furthermore,
given that the brands that are studied in
our research are human beings, using the
additional human personality traits to
complement the brand image framework
helps to broaden and strengthen the
analysis.
Following Caprara et al 31 and Harris and
Fleming’s44 work, and Davies et al’s43 rec-
ommendation of using a larger number of
dimensions for developing a more universal
scale, traits from both Caprara et al’s16 Big
Five Factor structure for describing political
candidates and Aaker’s 15 dimensions of
brand personality are used to build a brand
image framework for political candidates.
We argue, in agreement with Azoulay and
Kapferer 34 and Davies et al43 that by ana-
lysing the proposed dimensions of brand
personality, what is really being identified
are the dimensions of brand image.
a comprehensive brand image framework,
we combined Aaker’s15 42 final brand
personality scale traits with the 25 adjec-
tives used to measure politicians’ person-
alities by Caprara et al.16 From the 67 traits
obtained, only 58 were used to build the
brand image framework, given that four
traits are found on both lists (reliable, sin-
cere, original and confident), and five traits
became irrelevant or redundant when
translated to Spanish to describe presiden-
tial candidates (real, exciting, spirited,
unique and feminine). Bosnjak et al 36
would argue in favour of including both
positively and negatively balanced traits.
However, all the traits that we used had
to be positively balanced, due to Article
38 of the Mexican Federal Electoral Pro-
cedures and Institutions Code (COFIPE)
that prohibits any expression that deni-
grates citizens, public institutions, political
parties or its candidates, such as negative
descriptions in electoral surveys. There-
fore, we assumed that a low score on
any specific trait is equivalent to an
unfavourable perception. The 58 traits that
were included in the study are listed in
Table 1.

Table 1: Combined personality traits included in study

Sincerity Excitement Competence Sophistication Ruggedness

Aaker’s brand Down to earth Daring Hardworking Upper class Outdoorsy

personality Family oriented Trendy Secure Glamorous Masculine
scale Small town Cool Intelligent Good looking Western
Honest Young Technical Charming Tough
Wholesome Imaginative Corporate Smooth Rugged
Cheerful Up-to-date Successful
Sentimental Independent Leader
Friendly Contemporary
Energy Agreeableness Conscientiousness Emotional stability Openness
Caprara et al’s Happy Authentic Reliable Level-headed Sharp
candidate Determined Cordial Constant Optimistic Creative
personality Dynamic Generous Efficient Serene Innovative
scale Energetic Loyal Scrupulous Self-confident Modern
Enterprising Sincere Responsible Solid Original

© 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 3, 207–217 211
 Guzmán and Sierra
RESEARCH METHOD
To ensure the validity and generalisability
of the brand image framework, a national
household survey was administered between
11 and 17 March 2006 to 1144 Mexican
registered voters over the age of 18 years.
The sample was selected in multiple stages
based on the Mexican Federal Electoral
Institute’s numerical list of voters in each
state. The questionnaire was administered
in all 32 states in Mexico, and in 88 dif-
ferent locations for which households were
chosen systematically. Individuals were
selected by random sample based on sex
and age. A door-to-door survey method
was used to contact the respondents. From
the 1144 surveys, 1089 valid responses were
obtained. The study used a 95 per cent
confidence level and a margin of error
of + / − 3.5 per cent. The demographic
characteristics of the sample are presented
in Table 2.
The respondents were asked to evaluate,
using a five-point Likert scale ranging from
1 (not at all descriptive) to 5 (extremely
descriptive), the personality – brand image –
of the three principal political candidates,
based on the 58 selected traits. The order
of both the adjectives and the candidates
was rotated in order to control for primacy
and recency effects.
RESULTS
The average scores and standard deviations
obtained by each of the candidates can be
observed in Table 3. It must be noted that
these scores represent how voters described
each of the candidates in mid-March of
Table 2: Sample demographic characteristics
Age Sex Level of education
Min 18 Male 51.00% None 6.29%
Max 87 Female 49.00% Elementary 37.10%
Mean 40.14 Middle school 25.17%
SD 15.43 High school 20.22%
University 11.20%
212 © 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management
2006, and that the scores for each candidate
could have varied if the survey had been
conducted closer to the date of the election
(July 2006).
The average scores of the scale items
assigned to the three candidates were first
subjected to a Principal Components Anal-
ysis using oblique rotation. The scale items
for each factor were next checked for
internal consistency (see Table 4). All the
Alpha scores were above 0.80, indicating
good levels of internal consistency.45 The
extraction of the resulting factors was
undertaken in an iterative manner. First, the
traits that were not well represented in the
solution were excluded (that is, adjectives
with communalities < 0.40), and second, in
the case of cross-loadings, adjectives were
assigned to the factor with a larger loading.
A final five-factor solution, which included
26 traits, was obtained, with an explained
variance of 60.358 per cent. The obtained
levels of correlation between each factor are
presented in Table 5.
Once the overall brand image frame-
work was obtained, we subjected it to a
confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) using a
structural equation modelling procedure46–48
that analysed the factor structure for each
individual candidate. The CFA fit indices
presented in Table 6 provide indications of
acceptable reliability (internal consistency)
and convergent and discriminant validity
for the resulting scale items in this study.
DISCUSSION
The five factors are a combined result of
Aaker’s15 brand personality and the Caprara
Occupation Class considered
Private company 16.02% Low 27.03%
Public sector 6.17% Mid-low 31.38%
Freelance 28.94% Middle 36.86%
Student 5.65% Mid-high 2.44%
Housewife 34.08% High 0.43%
Retired/Unemployed 9.11%
Vol. 17, 3, 207–217
 A political candidate’s brand image scale

Table 3: Means and standard deviations

Felipe Calderón AMLO Roberto Madrazo

Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD

1. Down-to-earth 2.55 1.15 2.71 1.28 2.32 1.25

2. Family oriented 2.88 1.19 2.73 1.21 2.67 1.24
3. Small town 2.31 1.19 2.77 1.29 2.28 1.17
4. Honest 2.48 1.23 2.56 1.27 2.19 1.16
5. Wholesome 3.24 1.28 3.27 1.22 3.09 1.27
6. Cheerful 3.01 1.23 3.21 1.24 2.81 1.22
7. Sentimental 2.88 1.19 3.06 1.23 2.71 1.19
8. Friendly 2.92 1.22 3.10 1.26 2.72 1.24
9. Daring 2.85 1.23 3.18 1.28 2.91 1.26
10. Trendy 2.63 1.24 2.60 1.21 2.56 1.21
11. Cool 2.68 1.20 2.87 1.25 2.48 1.16
12. Young 2.74 1.21 2.80 1.23 2.55 1.18
13. Imaginative 2.91 1.21 3.16 1.20 2.83 1.22
14. Up-to-date 3.19 1.26 3.24 1.22 3.03 1.27
15. Independent 2.81 1.27 2.97 1.28 2.69 1.27
16. Contemporary 2.69 1.15 2.84 1.15 2.61 1.15
17. Hardworking 3.04 1.24 3.29 1.24 2.84 1.25
18. Secure 2.67 1.29 2.77 1.29 2.36 1.21
19. Intelligent 3.16 1.22 3.34 1.20 2.99 1.26
20. Technical 2.69 1.17 2.87 1.17 2.58 1.16
21. Corporate 2.89 1.19 2.94 1.16 2.76 1.17
22. Leader 2.96 1.24 3.28 1.24 2.89 1.23
23. Successful 3.04 1.21 3.34 1.22 2.91 1.25
24. Upper class 3.48 1.30 3.24 1.26 3.50 1.34
25. Glamorous 2.36 1.26 2.30 1.21 2.24 1.18
26. Good looking 2.20 1.24 2.15 1.18 2.11 1.19
27. Charming 2.27 1.19 2.38 1.26 2.18 1.16
28. Smooth 2.85 1.22 3.01 1.23 2.63 1.21
29. Outdoorsy 2.83 1.27 3.04 1.31 2.76 1.25
30. Masculine 2.80 1.24 2.75 1.22 2.71 1.24
31. Occidental 2.27 1.16 2.34 1.19 2.28 1.19
32. Tough 2.97 1.21 3.15 1.25 2.92 1.24
33. Rugged 2.64 1.20 2.87 1.20 2.85 1.24
34. Happy 3.09 1.31 3.15 1.28 2.83 1.29
35. Determined 2.99 1.21 3.18 1.20 2.87 1.23
36. Dynamic 2.98 1.19 3.09 1.18 2.82 1.17
37. Energetic 3.21 1.22 3.36 1.21 3.08 1.24
38. Enterprising 3.06 1.18 3.26 1.20 2.88 1.22
39. Authentic 2.85 1.22 2.99 1.23 2.62 1.21
40. Cordial 3.08 1.25 3.16 1.24 2.81 1.23
41. Generous 2.75 1.23 3.00 1.28 2.51 1.20
42. Loyal 2.66 1.24 2.76 1.27 2.36 1.17
43. Sincere 2.58 1.28 2.73 1.32 2.33 1.19
44. Reliable 2.60 1.26 2.77 1.29 2.36 1.22
45. Constant 2.90 1.19 3.11 1.23 2.71 1.22
46. Efficient 2.87 1.19 3.07 1.20 2.69 1.16
47. Scrupulous 2.67 1.19 2.90 1.21 2.60 1.18
48. Responsible 3.01 1.23 3.13 1.23 2.73 1.24
49. Level-headed 2.66 1.20 2.80 1.22 2.49 1.14
50. Optimistic 3.16 1.25 3.33 1.21 3.00 1.21
51. Serene 2.96 1.25 2.97 1.25 2.71 1.21
52. Self-confident 3.15 1.31 3.28 1.27 3.03 1.28
53. Solid 2.79 1.21 2.94 1.25 2.66 1.18
54. Sharp 3.10 1.28 3.42 1.26 3.17 1.31
55. Creative 2.91 1.20 3.15 1.21 2.84 1.21
56. Innovative 2.82 1.19 3.01 1.23 2.70 1.18
57. Modern 2.77 1.19 2.78 1.17 2.65 1.16
58. Original 2.81 1.26 3.07 1.30 2.66 1.24

© 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 3, 207–217 213
 Guzmán and Sierra

Table 4: Principal Component Analysis – Candidate brand image

1 2 3 4 5

Intelligent/Inteligente 0.769 — — — —
Leader/Líder 0.811 — — — —
Successful/Existoso 0.821 — — — —
Hardworking/Trabajador 0.597 — — — —
Enterprising/Emprendedor 0.591 — — — —
Energetic/Con energía 0.590 — — — —
Dynamic/Dinámico 0.560 — — — —
Constant/Constante 0.446 — — — —
Responsible/Responsable 0.421 — — — —
Creative/Creativo — 0.795 — — —
Innovative/Innovador — 0.789 — — —
Modern/Moderno — 0.727 — — —
Original/Original — 0.631 — — —
Sharp/Astuto 0.460 0.528 — — —
Cheerful/Alegre — — 0.723 — —
Sentimental/Emotivo — — 0.742 — —
Friendly/Amigable — — 0.755 — —
Cool/Chido — — 0.704 — —
Young/Jovial — — 0.559 — —
Sincere/Sincero — — — 0.912 —
Reliable/Confiable — — — 0.817 —
Loyal/Leal — — — 0.806 —
Generous/Generoso — — — 0.550 —
Glamorous/Atractivo — — — — 0.868
Good looking/Guapo — — — — 0.896
Charming/Encantador — — — — 0.744

% Variance (60.35%) 37.3 9.0 5.2 4.7 4.1

Cronbach’s Alpha 0.89 0.80 0.80 0.82 0.85

Table 5: Correlation matrix

Factors 1 2 3 4

2 0.624 — — —
3 0.568 0.491 — —
4 0.493 0.522 0.469 —
5 0.198 0.291 0.305 0.428

Table 6: Confirmatory Factor Analysis

2 df P-value RMSEA GFI AGFI NFI CFI IFI

A. Felipe Calderón 1288.50 289 0.000 0.055 0.92 0.90 0.98 0.98 0.98
B. AMLO 1307.58 289 0.000 0.056 0.92 0.90 0.98 0.98 0.98
C. Roberto Madrazo 1333.05 289 0.000 0.056 0.92 0.90 0.97 0.98 0.98

et al’s16 candidate personality frameworks. dimensions. These results are generalisable

As several of these factors are similar to within the Mexican cultural domain. The
those resulting from previous research, we first resulting factor, capability, combines
decided to use the same name for some nine traits from both the brand and the

214 © 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 3, 207–217

candidate personality frameworks: hard-
working, intelligent, leader and successful
from the brand personality framework; and
dynamic, energetic, enterprising, constant
and responsible from the candidate person-
ality framework. We can relate these last
two traits with the first four as all of them
describe the candidates’ capability. Dynamic,
enterprising and constant – traits that are
part of the energy factor in the Caprara
et al’s16 framework – are a separate facet of
this first factor. Hence, the first factor, the
candidates’ perceived capability, is consti-
tuted by two facets, one that refers to how
competent candidates are and a second that
refers to how much energy they have.
The second resulting factor, openness, is
configured by the traits sharp, creative,
innovative, modern and original. This
factor is identical to the openness factor
described in the Caprara et al’s16 candidate
personality framework. The third resulting
factor, empathy, includes five traits described
in the brand personality framework –
cheerful, sentimental, friendly, cool and
young. The fourth resulting factor includes
four traits described in the candidate’s per-
sonality framework, three of which are
included in the agreeableness factor. Agree-
ableness is configured by the following traits:
generous, loyal, sincere and reliable. The
fact that reliable is added to three ‘agreea-
bleness’ traits could be due to the way in
Table 7: A brand image framework of presidential candidates
Capability Openness
Competence
• Hardworking • Sharp
• Intelligent • Creative
• Leader • Innovative
• Successful • Modern
• Constant • Original
• Responsible
Energy
• Dynamic
• Energetic
• Enterprising
© 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX
A political candidate’s brand image scale
which reliable is translated into Spanish:
‘confiable.’ Confiable can also be understood
as trustworthy, and therefore it makes sense
that it appears grouped together with gen-
erous, loyal and sincere within the agreea-
bleness factor. The fifth resulting factor is
configured by three traits described within
the sophistication factor in the brand per-
sonality framework: glamorous (translated
as atractivo), good looking and charming.
This new factor, which we name handsome-
ness, confirms the importance of a candi-
date’s image to its brand framework. The
summarised brand image framework is
illustrated in Table 7.
CONCLUSION
This study has attempted to bridge the con-
ceptual gap between political marketing
literature and the idea that political candi-
dates can be viewed as brands, by analysing
their brand image. The developed brand
image framework identifies the elements
that configure the candidates’ brand image
in the minds of Mexican voters. Our results
show that, in Mexico, presidential candi-
dates are primarily evaluated according to
how capable they seem to be, and that this
capability is described by the level of per-
ceived competence – political, managerial
and leadership – and energy of the candi-
date. Additionally, the Mexican voter con-
siders how much empathy he feels towards
Empathy Agreeableness Handsomeness
• Cheerful • Generous • Glamorous
• Sentimental • Loyal • Good looking
• Friendly • Sincere • Charming
• Cool • Reliable
• Young
Brand Management Vol. 17, 3, 207–217 215
 Guzmán and Sierra
the candidate and how open and kind he
believes the candidate to be. Finally, the
fact that handsomeness resulted as a factor
within the framework suggests that the
Mexican voter is influenced on some level
by the candidates’ physical appearance,
confirming the widely held belief that a
candidate’s physical image is relevant to
voters’ decisions. This brand image frame-
work can thus provide a foundation for
future political campaigns in Mexico,
and a starting point for understanding
which elements may form part of a candi-
date’s brand image in other parts of the
world.
Due to the complexity of the study and
the difficulty in replicating it on a national
level, it was not possible to undertake a
follow-up study closer to the election.
Although the scale item means results
obtained in mid-March of 2006 are clearly
more favourable for Andrés Manuel López
Obrador, several incidents that occurred
during the following months combined
with an aggressive negative communication
campaign against him overturned his more
than 10 point lead. We strongly believe that
the scores obtained by each candidate
would have been different if the survey had
been conducted closer to the date of the
election. However, we also believe that the
brand image framework model itself would
not have suffered any changes, given that
the relationships between attributes would
have remained constant and grouped under
the same factors. Therefore, a key limita-
tion of this study is that it was not possible
to collect data in a secondary time period.
Further research could thus focus on vali-
dating this framework either in Mexico or
for political candidates in other countries.
The results of this study provide a first step
to understanding why and how it is that
citizens view candidates as brands, and
encourage further research on the use of
the brand personality concept and its appli-
cability to different kinds of brands.
216 © 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors thank Dr Roberto Rueda,
President of the Central Zone of Tecnológico
de Monterrey, for financially supporting this
study, and Dr Audhesh Paswan for his inval-
uable guidance and comments.
REFERENCES
(1) CORE Global Survey. (2005) http://www.undp
.org/governance/docs/Elections-Pub-Core.pdf,
accessed 5 April 2008.
(2) Newman, B.I. (1994) The Marketing of the
President: Political Marketing as Campaign Strategy.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
(3) Shama, A. (1976) The marketing of political
candidates. Journal of the Academy of Marketing
Science 4(4): 764–777.
(4) Valentino, N.A., Hutchings, V.L. and Williams, D.
(2004) The impact of political advertising on
knowledge, Internet information seeking, and
candidate preference. Journal of Communication
54(2): 337–354.
(5) Devlin, L.P. (2005) Contrasts in presidential
campaign commercials of 2004. American
Behavioral Scientist 49(2): 279–313.
(6) Lock, A. and Harris, P (1996) Political marketing –
vive la difference! European Journal of Marketing
30(10/11): 14–24.
(7) Needham, C. (2006) Brands and political loyalty.
Journal of Brand Management 13(3): 178–187.
(8) Caprara, G.V., Barbaranelli, C. and Zimbardo, P.G.
(1997) Politicians’ uniquely simple personalities.
Nature 385: 493.
(9) Feldman, S. and Conover, P.J. (1983) Candidates,
issues, and voters: The role of inference in political
perception. The Journal of Politics 45(4): 810–839.
(10) Schneider, H. (2004) Branding in politics –
manifestations, relevance and identity-oriented
management. Journal of Political Marketing 3(3):
41–67.
(11) McGirt, E. (2008) The brand called Obama.
Fast Company, http://www.fastcompany.com/
magazine/124/the-brand-called-obama.html ,
accessed 1 April 2009.
(12) Romano, A. (2008) Expertinent: Why the Obama
‘brand’ is working. Newsweek, http://www.blog
.newsweek.com/blogs/stumper/archive/2008/
02/27/how-obama-s-branding-is-working-on-
you.aspx, accessed 1 April 2009.
(13) Smith, B. (2009) Public still sky-high on Obama
‘brand’. Politico, http://www.politico.com/news/
stories/0209/18861_Page2.html, accessed 1 April
2009.
(14) Ries, A. (2008) What marketers can learn
from Obama’s campaign: Change – and posi-
tioning – you can believe in. Advertising Age, http:
//adage.com/print?article_id=132237, accessed 5
November 2008.
Brand Management Vol. 17, 3, 207–217

(15) Aaker, J.L. (1997) Dimensions of brand person-
ality. Journal of Marketing Research 34(3): 347–356.
(16) Caprara, G.V., Barbaranelli, C. and Zimbardo,
P.G. (2002) When parsimony subdues distinctive-
ness: Simplified public perceptions of politicians’
personality. Political Psychology 23(1): 77–95.
(17) Funk, C.L. (1999) Bringing the candidate into
models of candidate evaluation. The Journal of
Politics 61(3): 700–722.
(18) Popkin, S., Gorman, J.W., Phillips, C. and Smith,
J.A. (1976) Comment: What have you done for
me lately? Toward an investment theory of voting.
The American Political Science Review 70(3):
779–805.
(19) Shabad, G. and Andersen, K. (1979) Candidate
evaluations by men and women. Public Opinion
Quarterly 43(1): 18–35.
(20) Conover, P.J. and Feldman, S. (1989) Candidate
perception in an ambiguous world: Campaigns,
cues, and inference process. American Journal of
Political Science 33(4): 912–940.
(21) Newman, B.I. (2001) Image-manufacturing in
the USA: Recent US presidential elections and
beyond. European Journal of Marketing 35(9/10):
966–970.
(22) Miller, A.H., Wattenberg, M.P. and Malanchuk,
O. (1986) Schematic assessments of presidential
candidates. The American Political Science Review
80(2): 521–540.
(23) Pierce, P.A. (1993) Political sophistication and the
use of candidate traits in candidate evaluation.
Political Psychology 14(1): 21–35.
(24) Nakanishi, M., Cooper, L.G. and Kassarijian,
H.H. (1974) Voting for a political candidate under
conditions of minimal information. Journal of
Consumer Research 1(2): 36–43.
(25) Smith, G. (2001) The 2001 general election:
Factors influencing the brand image of political
parties and their leaders. Journal of Marketing
Management 17(9/10): 989–1006.
(26) Hockett, J. (2005) Brand ‘W’ and the marketing
of an American president: Or, logos as logos.
Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture 2(2):
72–96.
(27) Pinkleton, B. (1997) The effects of negative com-
parative political advertising on candidate evalua-
tions and advertising evaluations: An exploration.
Journal of Advertising 26(1): 19–29.
(28) Klein, J.G. and Ahluwalia, R. (2005) Negativity
in the evaluation of political candidates. Journal of
Marketing 69(1): 131–142.
(29) Yoon, K., Pinkleton, B.E. and Ko, W. (2005)
Effects of negative political advertising on voting
intention: An exploration of the roles of involve-
ment and source credibility in the development of
voter cynicism. Journal of Marketing Communications
11(2): 95–112.
(30) Williams, A.P. and Trammell, K.D. (2005)
Candidate campaign e-mail messages in the
presidential election 2004. American Behavioral
Scientist 49(4): 560–574.
© 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1350-23IX Brand Management
A political candidate’s brand image scale
(31) Caprara, G.V., Barbaranelli, C. and Guido, G.
(2001) Brand personality: How to make the
metaphor fit? Journal of Economic Psychology 22(3):
377–395.
(32) Goldberg, L.R. (1990) An alternative ‘description
of personality’: The big-five factor structure.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 59(6):
1216–1229.
(33) Skarz·yńska, K. (2004) Politicians in television:
‘The Big Five’ in impression formation. Journal of
Political Marketing 3(2): 31–45.
(34) Azoulay, A. and Kapferer, J.N. (2003) Do brand
personality scales really measure brand personality?
Journal of Brand Management 11(2): 143–155.
(35) Austin, J.R., Siguaw, J.A. and Mattila, A.S. (2003)
A re-examination of the generalizability of the
Aaker brand personality measurement framework.
Journal of Strategic Marketing 11(2): 77–92.
(36) Bosnjak, M., Bochmann, V. and Hufschmidt, T.
(2007) Dimensions of brand personality attribu-
tions: A person-centric approach in the German
cultural context. Social Behavior and Personality
35(3): 303–316.
(37) Diamantopoulos, A., Smith, G. and Grime, I.
(2005) The impact of brand extensions on brand
personality: Experimental evidence. European
Journal of Marketing 39(1/2): 129–149.
(38) Rojas-Méndez, J.I., Ernechun-Podlech, I. and
Silva-Olave, E. (2004) The ford brand personality in
Chile. Corporate Reputation Review 7(3): 232–251.
(39) Supphellen, M. and Grønhaug, K. (2003) Building
foreign brand personalities in Russia: The moder-
ating effect of consumer ethnocentrism. Interna-
tional Journal of Advertising 22(2): 203–226.
(40) Plummer, J.T. (1984/85) How personality makes
a difference. Journal of Advertising Research 24(6):
27–31.
(41) Keller, K.L. (1993) Conceptualizing, measuring,
and managing customer-based brand equity.
Journal of Marketing 57(1): 1–22.
(42) Kapferer, J.N. (1998) Strategic Brand Mangement,
2nd edn. New York: Kogan Page.
(43) Davies, G., Chun, R., Vinhas da Silva, R. and
Roper, S. (2001) The personification metaphor as
a measurement approach for corporate reputation.
Corporate Reputation Review 4(2): 113–127.
(44) Harris, E.G. and Fleming, D.E. (2005) Assessing
the human element in service personality formation:
Personality congruency and the five factor model.
Journal of Services Marketing 19(4): 187–198.
(45) Nunnally, J.C. (1978) Psychometric Theory, 2nd edn.
New York: McGraw-Hill.
(46) Anderson, J.C. and Gerbing, D.W. (1988) Struc-
tural equation modeling in practice: A review and
recommended two-step approach. Psychological
Bulletin 103(3): 411–423.
(47) Bollen, K.A. (1989) Structural Equations with Latent
Variables. New York: Wiley.
(48) Jöreskog, K.G. and Sörbom, D. (1996) LISREL 8:
User’s Reference Guide. Chicago, IL: Scientific
Software International.
Vol. 17, 3, 207–217 217
Copyright of Journal of Brand Management is the property of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. and its content may not
be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written
permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.