IMPACTS OF SOCIAL MEDIA COMMUNICATION ON CUSTOMER PRODUCT ATTITUDE AND POTENTIAL FOR WORD-OF-MOUTH

Current research has found evidence that consumer choices are driven by hedonic and utilitarian considerations, and that word-of-mouth is an effective strategy to influence consumers’ attitudes. However, few studies have been involved in how social media messages affect consumers when two different groups of people generate them for either hedonic or utilitarian purposes. This study sought to expand this contemporary understanding of how social impacts of consumer-generated content and marketer-generated content. The study also compared the influence of hedonic messages and utilitarian messages. Results suggest that, compared to marketer-generated messages, consumer-generated utilitarian messages have greater impact. The results also indicate that the social media marketing messages are more effective in influencing consumer attitudes when the product belongs to the hedonic category. Taking the results of this study and other researches into account, I discussed the relative theoretical and practical implications.

Grantor dc:publisher

Wake Forest University

Year dc:date.issued

2013

Author dc:creator

• Zhang, Rui

• Consumer Product Attitudes

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10339/39031

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:wakespace.lib.wfu.edu:10339/39031