社会化电子商务中卖家与非卖家信息分享行为差异

Information Sharing Behavior in Social Commerce:The Differences between Sellers and Non-sellers

目前社会化电子商务对用户分享行为的激励措施单一,缺乏吸引力,急需个性化的、有针对性的激励方式。社会化电子商务网站上,除了普通用户分享产品和购物信息外,一些电子商务卖家也分享产品相关信息以吸引消费者,拥有不同身份属性的用户被不同因素所激励。因此,为了设计个性化的激励方式,社会化电子商务平台需要进一步了解激励用户信息分享行为的关键因素的影响强度是否随着卖家与非卖家身份属性的不同而有所差异。基于社会认知理论提出影响用户分享行为的关键因素,包括预期个人结果、预期社区结果和自我效能。采用目标理论,认为卖家为自我卷入型用户,非卖家为任务卷入型用户,并对卖家和非卖家不同身份用户的信息分享行为影响因素的差异建立理论研究模型。采用问卷调查法收集1 177位社会化电子商务用户的信息分享意愿及其影响因素的相关数据,运用Spss19. 0进行测量模型和t检验分析,以验证假设。研究结果表明,结果期望和自我效能对信息分享意愿的影响强度在卖家与非卖家之间有显著的差异,卖家的分享意愿更多地受到预期个人结果和自我效能的影响,非卖家的分享意愿受到预期社区结果的影响。研究结果拓展了社会化电子商务领域关于信息分享行为的相关研究,为后续研究提供了可能性。建议电子商务网站运营者在制定和实施激励计划时,应充分考虑用户的不同身份属性,有针对性地提供激励,以最大化地鼓励用户参与,保障网站健康发展。

With customers＇ tendency to interact with others during purchase, social commerce has gained an increasing develop- ment in the past decade. In social commerce, users＇ information sharing behavior is the most frequent observed behavior among users＇ interactions. It also guarantees the sustainability of social commerce sites and supports the social marketing campaigns, thus users＇ information sharing behavior should be encouraged. However, the current incentives to encourage users＇ sharing be- havior are pale and lack attractions. Therefore, it is imperative to explore some individualized and customized incentives. In so- cial commerce sites, on one hand, people who purchase products can share product- and purchase-related information; on the other hand, some sellers can also share product-related information in order to attract customers. Users with different identity might be driven by different incentives. Thus, in order to develop customized incentives, it is necessary for social commerce sites to understand whether the underlying mechanisms or key factors that drive users＇ information sharing behavior are different across different user identity（ i. e. , sellers and non-sellers）. On the basis of social cognitive theory, this study focuses on two types of antecedents namely outcome expectancy（ including both expected personal outcome and expected community outcome） and self-efficacy. Drawing on goal theory, the current study expects that sellers are ego-involved users and non-sellers are task-involved users, and builds up a research model that depicts the differences between sellers and non-sellers in the effects of outcome expectancy and self-efficacy on the information sharing behaviors. To test proposed research model and hypotheses, an empirical study is conducted by collecting survey data from 1 177 users of ＂Meilishuo. com＂. The Spss 19.0 is utilized to conduct t model analysis and t-test. The t-test results propose that the effects of expected personal outcome, expected community outcome, and self-efficacy on information sharing behaviors are significantly different between sellers and non-sellers. Specifically, the information sharing in- tention of sellers is affected more by expected personal outcome and self-efficacy; while the non-sellers are inclined to be affected by expected community outcome when they share information in social commerce sites. Through the empirical study, we enrich the literature of social commerce by exploring the differences between sellers and non-sellers on the key factors that influence users＇ information sharing behavior. In so doing, we set light to future studies on in- vestigating users＇ information sharing behavior in social commerce sites. Our empirical findings can also provide social commerce sites operators with guidance that user identity should be considered when establishing stimulus. With customized stimulus, oper- ators can maintain sustainability and promote healthy development of their social commerce sites.