Implementasi dan Kontribusi Ilmu Akuntansi, Manajemen, & Bisnis dalam Pembangunan Ketahanan Ekonomi Nasional COMPARING THE USE OF FAMOUS ENDORSER AND LAY ENDORSER IN PREDICTING CONSUMER INTENTION TO BUY: INDONESIAN CONTEXT Wenny Purnama Sari wenevereline@hotmail.co.id Sabrina O. Sihombing sabrinasihombing@gmail.com Business School, Universitas Pelita Harapan, Indonesia Abstract Consumers are live in hyper choice era nowadays. Many brands and products are available to be chosen in the market. Many options may improve the quality of human life. However, consumers have limitations especially time and cognitive limitations in processing a lot of information of brands and products available in a market. Marketing and consumer behavior research shows that consumers rely on memory about brand, advertising, opinions of others, and well-known brands in choosing a specific brand in a number of brand choices. The use of endorsers is one main way to increase advertising impacts. This research aims to compare the use of famous endorser and lay endorser in advertisements in predicting consumer intention in buying a consumer goods product. A total of 290 undergraduate students participated in this study. The data was then analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results show that the use of famous endorser in product advertisement is more effective than the use of lay endorser. This paper also provides the implications for managerial and offers directions for future research. Keywords: famous endorser, lay endorser, advertisement, structural equation modeling INTRODUCTION Consumers are live in hyper choice era nowadays. Many brands and products are available to be chosen in the market. Many options may improve the quality of human life (Markus & Schwartz, 2010). However, consumers have limitations especially time and cognitive limitations in processing a lot of information of brands and products available in a market. Marketing and consumer behavior research shows that consumers rely on memory about brand, advertising, opinions of others, and well-known brands in choosing a specific brand in a number of brand choices. On the other hand, marketers also have to work hard so that their brands can be remembered and purchased by consumers. For that reason, advertising is one important media to support consumers in recognizing and remembering a brand. Yet, consumers are exposed to thousands of ads every day. The use of endorsers is one main way to increase advertising impacts (Rodriguez, 2008). Specifically, the use of celebrities as endorsers of a brand or product is the main key to attract consumer‟s attention (Zoubi & Bataineh, 2011; Gaied & Rached, 2010; Rodgizer, 2008; Waldt et al., 2007). However, the selection of the celebrity endorser must consider the characteristics possessed by celebrities so as to correspond to the product (Gaied & Rached, 2010).