Celebrity endorsement in international destination marketing: Evidence from eye-tracking techniques and laboratory experiments

• Examines the effectiveness of different types of celebrity endorsement. • Combines eye-tracking techniques with self-report method. • A source celebrity is more effective in eliciting tourist responses. • Examines a serial mediation model underlying the main effect. • Examines the moderating role of regulatory focus. Celebrity endorsement has become ubiquitous in international destination marketing, but studies have rarely assessed the differences between the effects of endorsement by a local celebrity vs. a celebrity from tourist source countries (source celebrity). To bridge the literature gap, this paper draws on meaning transfer theory and match-up hypothesis to examine the effectiveness of these two types of celebrity endorsement by exploring the underlying mechanism. By carrying out a pretest and three experiments, the eye-tracking results and lab experiments show that international destination marketing involving a source celebrity (vs. local celebrity) can significantly increase tourists’ visual attention to the advertising destination scenery, positive attitudes toward the destination and intentions to visit. Furthermore, a serial mediation model of celebrity endorsement → celebrity–tourist congruency → tourist attitude toward celebrity → tourist response is also identified. Finally, this paper empirically examines the moderating role of regulatory focus on the celebrity endorsement effect.