Exploring factors influencing mobile users' intention to adopt multimedia messaging service

Abstract

While short messaging service (SMS) is discussed often in recent literature, multimedia messaging service (MMS), a media rich successor of SMS, is seldom heard or understood by mobile users in Taiwan. The adoption rates of MMS are far from satisfactory, implying that there might be some factors keeping the potential users away from using MMS. This research integrates a qualitative method, the Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique, with the quantitative questionnaire survey to elicit and validate underlying factors which influence potential users' attitude and intention toward the adoption of MMS. A research model together with eight hypotheses was formulated, and a questionnaire based survey was administrated to mobile users knowledgeable about mobile messaging services for empirically validating the research model and testing the hypotheses. Our research findings show that relative advantage and ease of use are important factors significantly influencing mobile users' adoption of MMS but the other two antecedents, facilitating conditions and previous experience, do not have significant and direct impacts on mobile users' intention to use MMS. These study results can be referenced by service providers for designing and developing successful business applications to catch the valuable opportunity and benefit of MMS.

Keywords:

• multimedia messaging service
• mobile commerce
• information and communication technology
• technology management
• Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET)