Abstract
The popularity of social network services (SNS) provides consumers with new channels to obtain information, and the convenience and diversity of information help consumers reduce the uncertainty and risk in online shopping. However, with the development of the internet, increasing information is available to consumers, and the information overload of online reviews (ORs) creates higher requirements for consumer information screening. Therefore, how to quickly and accurately identify useful information becomes important. There is much literature discussing the usefulness of online word of mouth and ORs, but these studies generally explore information selection and judgment in the traditional business to consumer environment and do not specifically explore social shopping in SNS. In addition, the existing results often only consider the quality factor of ORs and ignore the influence of consumers’ personal choice preferences and the characteristics of OR publishers on consumer behavior. From this, based on the theory of planned behavior and the online trust model, this paper determines the relevant factors and frameworks that affect the usefulness of ORs in the SNS environment. We start from the perspectives of reviewer-related and information-related aspects. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to analyze 237 samples for eight factors: credibility, social distance, evaluation (positive and negative), information quality (accuracy, timeliness, and integrity), and presentation. This study enriches the theory of OR usefulness in the SNS environment and provides a reference for the online marketing of enterprises.
Recommended Citation
Xu, Qianwen; Zheng, Miaomiao; Cao, Cong; and Jiang, Chunping, "How Do Consumers Identify Useful Review Information in a Social Media Environment?" (2021). ICEB 2021 Proceedings (Nanjing, China). 42.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/iceb2021/42