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When Social Media Can Be Bad for You: Community Feedback Stifles Consumer Creativity and Reduces Satisfaction with Self-Designed Products

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  • Christian Hildebrand

    (Center for Customer Insight, University of St. Gallen, CH-9000 St. Gallen, Switzerland)

  • Gerald Häubl

    (School of Business, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2R6, Canada; and Center for Customer Insight, University of St. Gallen, Switzerland CH-9000, St. Gallen)

  • Andreas Herrmann

    (Center for Customer Insight, University of St. Gallen, CH-9000 St. Gallen, Switzerland)

  • Jan R. Landwehr

    (Goethe University Frankfurt, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, D-60323 Frankfurt am Main, Germany)

Abstract

Enabling consumers to self-design unique products that match their idiosyncratic preferences is the key value driver of modern mass customization systems. These systems are increasingly becoming “social,” allowing for consumer-to-consumer interactions such as commenting on each other's self-designed products. The present research examines how receiving others' feedback on initial product configurations affects consumers' ultimate product designs and their satisfaction with these self-designed products. Evidence from a field study in a European car manufacturer's brand community and from two follow-up experiments reveals that receiving feedback from other community members on initial self-designs leads to less unique final self-designs, lower satisfaction with self-designed products, lower product usage frequency, and lower monetary product valuations. We provide evidence that the negative influence of feedback on consumers' satisfaction with self-designed products is mediated by an increase in decision uncertainty and perceived process complexity. The implications of socially enriched mass customization systems for both consumer welfare and seller profitability are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Christian Hildebrand & Gerald Häubl & Andreas Herrmann & Jan R. Landwehr, 2013. "When Social Media Can Be Bad for You: Community Feedback Stifles Consumer Creativity and Reduces Satisfaction with Self-Designed Products," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(1), pages 14-29, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:24:y:2013:i:1:p:14-29
    DOI: 10.1287/isre.1120.0455
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    Cited by:

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    2. Das, Kallol & Patel, Jayesh D. & Sharma, Anuj & Shukla, Yupal, 2023. "Creativity in marketing: Examining the intellectual structure using scientometric analysis and topic modeling," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    3. Narisa Zhao & Hui Li, 2020. "How can social commerce be boosted? The impact of consumer behaviors on the information dissemination mechanism in a social commerce network," Electronic Commerce Research, Springer, vol. 20(4), pages 833-856, December.
    4. Sheng, Jie & Amankwah-Amoah, Joseph & Wang, Xiaojun, 2017. "A multidisciplinary perspective of big data in management research," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 191(C), pages 97-112.
    5. Sinan Aral & Chrysanthos Dellarocas & David Godes, 2013. "Introduction to the Special Issue ---Social Media and Business Transformation: A Framework for Research," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(1), pages 3-13, March.
    6. Ivo Blohm & Christoph Riedl & Johann Füller & Jan Marco Leimeister, 2016. "Rate or Trade? Identifying Winning Ideas in Open Idea Sourcing," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 27(1), pages 27-48, March.
    7. Kimmy Wa Chan & Stella Yiyan Li & Jian Ni & John JianJun Zhu, 2021. "What Feedback Matters? The Role of Experience in Motivating Crowdsourcing Innovation," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(1), pages 103-126, January.
    8. Ravi Bapna & Akhmed Umyarov, 2015. "Do Your Online Friends Make You Pay? A Randomized Field Experiment on Peer Influence in Online Social Networks," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 61(8), pages 1902-1920, August.
    9. Chaïma Siala & Abdelmajid Amine & Kaouther Saied Benrached, 2020. "Exploring the role of feedback source and timing at crowdsourcing campaigns [Exploration du rôle joué par la source et le moment du Feedback durant les campagnes de crowdsourcing]," Post-Print hal-02952176, HAL.
    10. Sheng, Jie & Amankwah-Amoah, Joseph & Wang, Xiaojun, 2019. "Technology in the 21st century: New challenges and opportunities," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 321-335.
    11. Christian Hildebrand & Tobias Schlager, 2019. "Focusing on others before you shop: exposure to Facebook promotes conventional product configurations," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 47(2), pages 291-307, March.
    12. Krause, Franziska & Görgen, Jonas & de Bellis, Emanuel & Franke, Nikolaus & Burghartz, Pia & Klanner, Ilse-Maria & Häubl, Gerald, 2023. "One-of-a-kind products: Leveraging strict uniqueness in mass customization," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 823-840.
    13. Mamonov, Stanislav & Benbunan-Fich, Raquel, 2017. "Exploring factors affecting social e-commerce service adoption: The case of Facebook Gifts," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 37(6), pages 590-600.
    14. Kawaljeet Kaur Kapoor & Kuttimani Tamilmani & Nripendra P. Rana & Pushp Patil & Yogesh K. Dwivedi & Sridhar Nerur, 2018. "Advances in Social Media Research: Past, Present and Future," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 531-558, June.
    15. Jessica Braojos & Jose Benitez & Javier Llorens, 2019. "How do social commerce-IT capabilities influence firm performance? Theory and empirical evidence," Post-Print hal-02057780, HAL.
    16. Stephan Hankammer & Robin Kleer & Frank T. Piller, 2021. "Sustainability nudges in the context of customer co-design for consumer electronics," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 91(6), pages 897-933, August.
    17. Christoph Riedl & Victor P. Seidel, 2018. "Learning from Mixed Signals in Online Innovation Communities," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(6), pages 1010-1032, December.
    18. Emanuel de Bellis & Christian Hildebrand & Kenichi Ito & Andreas Herrmann, 2015. "Cross-national differences in uncertainty avoidance predict the effectiveness of mass customization across East Asia: a large-scale field investigation," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 26(3), pages 309-320, September.
    19. Tian Heong Chan & Jürgen Mihm & Manuel E. Sosa, 2018. "On Styles in Product Design: An Analysis of U.S. Design Patents," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(3), pages 1230-1249, March.

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