Designing social commerce platforms based on consumers’ intentions

Social commerce has been gaining momentum over the last few years as a novel form of e-commerce, creating substantial changes for both businesses and consumers. However, little is known about how consumer behaviour is influenced by characteristics on social commerce platforms. The purpose of this research is to elucidate how user intentions to purchase and to spread word-of-mouth (WOM) are influenced by characteristics present on social commerce platforms. More specifically, we adopt a uses-and-gratifications perspective and examine the influence of socialising, personal recommendation agents, product selection, and information availability. Partial least squares structural equation modelling analysis is performed on a sample of 165 social commerce users. Outcomes of the analysis indicate that socialising and personal recommendation agents positively influence purchase and WOM intentions, while product selection is found to only enhance purchase intentions. Interestingly, our findings reveal that information availability has no significant effect on purchase and WOM intentions. Finally, we find that when purchase intentions are triggered, they will tend increase consumers’ intentions to WOM.