Wanna Be a Friend on Social Media?

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 64-79
Author(s):  
Ayşegül Sağkaya Güngör ◽  
Dursun Yener ◽  
Mertcan Taşçıoğlu

As the volume of consumer-brand interactions is increasing in the social media setting, it becomes essential to understand how to foster relationships to create favorable attitudes towards the brand, stimulate sales, and enable consumers to forward the brand name to others. In this regard, this research focuses on the effect of communication style (formal vs. informal) that should be used for products that have different levels of self-expression (high vs. low) in social media communications. An experiment was conducted with 384 participants. The results indicated that consumers prefer informal communication regardless of the self-expression level of the product in social media. Investigating the interaction effects, the authors demonstrated that highly self-expressive products favorably stimulate word-of-mouth intention in case of formal communication. However, it is the informal communication that stimulates purchase and word-of-mouth intentions and brand attitudes when the product is low self-expressive in nature.

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Caroline S.L. Tan

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine psychological ownership (PO) experienced by followers of social media influencers toward both influencer and the product. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected using face-to-face semi-structured interviews that were conducted with 30 respondents and analyzed using thematic analysis. Findings The study demonstrated that the PO experienced by the follower changes under different conditions resulting from perceived value, social currency and follower activity. Social currency plays a vital role in determining the target of PO, often affecting the narrative by the follower. Originality/value To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first paper to examine the transference of PO between product and influencer as experienced by the follower. It provides an understanding on PO that is experienced in different levels of intensity and changes depending on the motive of the follower; hence, transference of PO occurs and it is not a static.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mazzini Muda ◽  
Muhammad Iskandar Hamzah

PurposeIn spite of the increasing organic and interactive marketing activities over social media, a general understanding of the source credibility of voluntary user-generated content (UGC) is still limited. In line with the social identity theory, this paper examines the effects of consumers' perceived source credibility of UGC in YouTube videos on their attitudes and behavioral intentions. Additionally, source homophily theory is included to predict the antecedent of source credibility.Design/methodology/approachThree hundred and seventy two Generation Y respondents were interviewed using snowball sampling. Data were analyzed with component-based structural equation modeling technique of partial least squares-structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).FindingsFindings confirmed that perceived source credibility indirectly affects purchase intention (PI) and electronic word-of-mouth via attitude toward UGC. Besides, perceived source credibility mediates the effect of perceived source homophily on attitude toward UGC.Practical implicationsSince today's consumers have begun to trust and rely more on UGC than company-generated content on social media when making purchase decisions, companies may reconsider democratizing certain aspects of their branding strategies. Firms may fine-tune their marketing communication budgets – not only just by sponsoring public figures and celebrities but also by nurturing coproductive engagements with independent content creators who are ordinary consumers. Endowed with their imposing credibility, these micro-influencers and prosumers have high potentials to be uplifted to brand ambassadors.Originality/valueWhile consumers' purchase outcome can be measured easily using metrics and analytics, the roles of source homophily in stages leading up to the purchase is still elusive. Drawing on the rich theoretical basis of source homophily may help researchers to understand not only how credibility and attitude are related to PI but also how this nexus generates positive word of mouth among UGC followers within the social media circles.


2020 ◽  
Vol 114 (4) ◽  
pp. 947-962
Author(s):  
TABITHA BONILLA ◽  
ALVIN B. TILLERY

The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement has organized hundreds of disruptive protests in American cities since 2013 (Garza 2014; Harris 2015; Taylor 2016). The movement has garnered considerable attention from the U.S. media and is well recognized by the U.S. public (Horowitz and Livingston 2016; Neal 2017). Social movement scholars suggest that such robust mobilizations are typically predicated on clear social movement frames (Benford and Snow 2000; Snow et al. 1986). Tillery (2019b) has identified several distinct message frames within the social media communications of BLM activists. In this paper, we use a survey experiment to test the effect of three of these frames—Black Nationalist, Feminist, and LGBTQ+ Rights—on the mobilization of African Americans. We find that exposure to these frames generates differential effects on respondents’ willingness to support, trust, canvass, and write representatives about the Black Lives Matter movement. These findings raise new questions about the deployment of intersectional messaging strategies within movements for racial justice.


2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 633-650 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis V. Casaló ◽  
Jaime Romero

Purpose Encouraging travelers to create value that benefits firms is of great relevance for companies that operate in online contexts. The purpose of this study is to investigate, focusing on online travel agencies, how monetary promotions (i.e. economic incentives) and non-monetary promotions (i.e. draws and contests) conducted through social media enhance customers’ voluntary behaviors (i.e. suggestions, word of mouth, and social media interactions) that go beyond brand choice, which may provide benefit to firms. Design/methodology/approach The research model draws on the social exchange theory, equity theory and the concept of perceived support – how customers perceive that companies care about their well-being. The authors collect information from 491 users of online travel agencies in Spain and test their hypotheses using partial least squares. They also evaluate the existence of indirect effects. Findings Promotions developed by companies make customers more likely to perform, voluntarily, the helping behaviors of suggestions, word of mouth and social media interactions, through the influence of perceived support. Research limitations/implications Use of a single survey to collect measures and restriction of the sample to Spanish-speaking travelers suggests caution in generalizing the results. Future research could investigate other company-initiated actions and other value-creating behaviors of travelers. Practical implications Promotions help develop perceived support for customers, which leads to voluntary, valuable traveler behaviors. Promotions may be also sufficient to trigger some customer behaviors, such as word-of-mouth. Originality/value Based on the social exchange and equity theories, this paper investigates the influence of social media promotions on customers’ voluntary behaviors via perceived support.


Author(s):  
Xiang Ying Mei ◽  
Ingrid K. Bagaas ◽  
Erling K. L. Relling

Customer complaints are unavoidable in any businesses and how firms handle such complaints will affect the public's perception of the company's brand and reputation. While storytelling is being embraced by an increasing number of companies as a different way to communicate their brand, many customers are now also using storytelling as an approach to voice their unfavourable experiences on the social media in regards to a particular unsatisfactory purchase as part of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM). Such creative and humorous complaints serve as a way to cut through the clutter in order to gain the company's attention. Those companies that embrace such complaints by responding in an equally humorous and creative manner as part of their service recovery process will manage to recover their customers as well as their employees. As such posts are often shared publicly on the Internet, they may become viral and thus can create great positive effect on the company's reputation. Hence, it is important to empower the employees to recover the services using untraditional responses.


Author(s):  
Xiang Ying Mei ◽  
Ingrid K. Bagaas ◽  
Erling K. L. Relling

Customer complaints are unavoidable in any businesses and how firms handle such complaints will affect the public's perception of the company's brand and reputation. While storytelling is being embraced by an increasing number of companies as a different way to communicate their brand, many customers are now also using storytelling as an approach to voice their unfavourable experiences on the social media in regards to a particular unsatisfactory purchase as part of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM). Such creative and humorous complaints serve as a way to cut through the clutter in order to gain the company's attention. Those companies that embrace such complaints by responding in an equally humorous and creative manner as part of their service recovery process will manage to recover their customers as well as their employees. As such posts are often shared publicly on the Internet, they may become viral and thus can create great positive effect on the company's reputation. Hence, it is important to empower the employees to recover the services using untraditional responses.


2020 ◽  
pp. 097639962093850
Author(s):  
Krishna Moorthy ◽  
Nik Mohamad Zaki Nik Salleh ◽  
Ang Xin Jie ◽  
Chan Shu Yi ◽  
Lau Shin Wei ◽  
...  

This study examines the social media usage of Malaysian millennials in planning their domestic holidays. This study integrated the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) and technology acceptance model (TAM) variables by adding electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM), as it is a crucial factor influencing the travel industry nowadays. Data were collected from 301 Malaysians. The results show that e-WOM is the greatest antecedent influencing Malaysian millennials to use social media in planning their domestic holidays. Local tourism organizations such as Tourism Malaysia could gain an understanding of the issue through this study, and the promotion of local tourism through social media could be developed to reach millennials in Malaysia.


2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ghania E. Zgheib ◽  
Nada Dabbagh

This study explored how experienced faculty are using social media to support student learning. It analysed the types of social media learning activities (SMLAs), their design, the cognitive processes that they support, and the types of knowledge that students engage in when completing SMLAs. Data gathered from five different cases of six faculty using social media in their courses revealed that social media has the potential to support student learning and promote different levels of cognitive processes and types of knowledge. Results also revealed that experienced faculty select social media tools based on their technology features or their popularity in the field of study, and they recommend integrating several media sources in the design of a single SMLA. Furthermore, this study suggested that experienced faculty who use social media, specifically wikis and blogs, use them as Learning Management Systems. Finally, the social factor of social media was not evident in the design of the learning activities, and faculty reported promoting more dialogue in their revised SMLA. The findings of this study yielded significant considerations for faculty when designing SMLA.


Author(s):  
Nurul Azizah

Social media offers a powerful way to promote and engage the consumer. However, there are too many information circulating on social media nowadays. This situation makes the consumers feel uncertain with the validity of information they find on social media. There are more than two million Facebook users globally, meaning that the platform still has big potential as an effective promotion tool. In this study, Social word of mouth (sWOM) theory is seen as a solution to reduce the uncertainty on the social media. Then, the dual-process theory is adapted to build the conceptual framework, which includes several variables including comment involvement, quality of comment, comment trust-ability, as well as uncertainty reduction. Item scales are adopted by the prior study and the questionnaire is composed with a back-translation technique. The collected data is tested using smart-PLS. Then the results are analyzed to observe both theoretical and managerial impact. The findings of the study suggest that all of the proposed variables have significant effect on the uncertainty reduction.


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