The celebrity superstar, the south superhero, the cricketing-demigod or the 90s heartthrob with the dad bod – all of them can be the crowning glory of your ad campaign. In fact, their quirks and personalities, their dialogues, hits, misses, on-screen kisses – it can all be the idea for your film. When you don’t actually HAVE an idea for your film. Because your idea then IS the celebrity.

If the idea of your ad is based on an inside joke a celebrity has with Karan Johar on Koffee With Karan, or on their love life, minus any insight, tension, twist – you don’t have an ad. You have a very expensively produced celebrity selfie. You can get a moment of ‘haha’ based on awe and aura. And that’s it.

Screenplay without strategy does what for your product? Makes for a great one-time watch. Gets it featured and forwarded. And soon, forgotten.

If your ad only works because of who is in it and not what it says, you’re building the celeb, not the brand.

Ranveer becomes the tonality of the brand. Ayushman becomes the personality. Alia becomes the voice. Dhoni is everywhere. Virat speaks for everything. And SRK’s voice, it overshadows all else. Is your idea big enough to win the fame game? Or is your idea to garner quick views in the name of a star?

Everything is muddled between crafting and casting...and your product or service? An afterthought. That’s mighty unfair. Especially after how much you’ve spent. For what? For all this grandeur on borrowed time – a time bound contract?

I often watch a celebrity ad and ask myself – would this work without the celebrity? If it will – then think of something new.

Use the celeb in a way only your brand can use the celeb; not vice versa.

Like the initial Cred ads, the Zepto Time ads with musicians Shankar Mahadevan, Kailash Kher, Usha Uthup, the Bangur Cement ad with Sunny Deol, the great Khali ad for Ambuja cement. These are examples of ads which make celebrities work for THEM, instead of the other way round. Skillfully done.

Honesty, a formula has set in.

Celebrities, especially the ones over-exposed and under-utilised on sets seem like a lazy cop-out. It’s easy – get a celebrity. This way, you bypass the need for a fresh narrative or creative device. Look, I get that it’s really tempting to be a sidekick to Ranbir Kapoor.

Or Deepika Padukone. But is that what you want for your brand?

“Celebretising” is a science. I see a lot of people trying to put a format to it. I’m no genius and I definitely don’t have it cracked. But I can tell when I see sameness. A pattern is easy to point out.

Here’s what I think.

We’re Instagram-reeling our way to fame and there’s a new celebrity per second. We doom-scroll fast and furious. In such a world, can we afford to NOT have an idea and ride solely on star power?

Celeb cannot be your idea. Idea first. Celeb later. Or else, your celeb is nothing but a cheat code.

The author is creative director, McCann Worldgroup.

This column was first published in our July issue. Click here to buy it.