Promoting electronic customer-to-customer interaction: evidence from social commerce sites

ABSTRACT

Social commerce facilitates communication among customers worldwide and promotes electronic customer-to-customer interaction (eCCI). Considerable research has been undertaken on consumer behaviour, but the understanding of the factors that drive eCCI is limited, particularly in the social commerce context. This limitation arises from a lack of theoretical frameworks to account for such behaviour. By using motivation–opportunity–ability (MOA) theory, this study aims to observe how MOA theory constructs (intrinsic motivation, perceived self-efficacy and tie strength with other customers) integrate and impact eCCI. A survey method is utilised to collect data, and structural equation modelling is used with 359 customers from social commerce sites in China. Results demonstrate that eCCI behaviour is strongly determined by intrinsic motivation, perceived self-efficacy and tie strength with other customers. Among these factors, intrinsic motivation partially mediates the association between perceived self-efficacy and eCCI. Moreover, tie strength with other customers moderates the relationship between intrinsic motivation and eCCI. Overall, this study introduces a new way of assessing eCCI and reports eCCI behaviour as a new and dynamic approach to explore how its outcomes can be enhanced in social commerce marketing. Such outcomes may help social commerce and service providers in delivering their services.

摘要

社交商务促进了全球顾客之间的交流，并推动了电子顾客间的互动（eCCI）。虽然在消费者行为方面已经进行了大量的研究，但对推动电子顾客间互动的因素的理解是有限的，特别是在社会商务环境中。这种局限源于缺乏解释这种行为的理论框架。通过使用动机-机会-能力（MOA）理论，本研究旨在观察MOA理论构建（内在动机、感知自我效能和与其他顾客的联系强度）如何整合并影响电子顾客间互动。本研究采用调查方法收集数据，并对来自中国社交商务网站的359名顾客进行了结构方程建模。结果表明，电子顾客间互动在很大程度上由内在动机、感知自我效能和与其他顾客的联系强度决定。在这些因素中，内在动机在感知自我效能和电子顾客间互动的关系中起到了部分中介作用。此外，与其他顾客的联系强度调节了内在动机和电子顾客间互动的关系。总的来说，本研究引入了一种评估电子顾客间互动的新方法，并将电子顾客间互动行为作为一种新的动态方法进行报告，以探索如何在社交商务营销中增强其结果。这种结果可能有助于社会商务和服务提供商提供服务。

KEYWORDS:

• Electronic customer-to-customer interaction
• perceived self-efficacy
• tie strength
• intrinsic motivation
• motivation–opportunity–ability theory

关键词:

• ：电子顾客间互动
• 感知自我效能
• 联系强度
• 内在动机
• 动机-机会-能力理论

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).