Intention to Engage in Social Commerce: Uses and Gratifications Approach

As businesses are seeking to leverage the benefits of social networks, social commerce has emerged to achieve greater economic value by combining the power of online social networks with online shopping. Whereas the importance of social commerce is widely recognized in current literature, there are limited studies on factors that affect the intention of individuals to engage in social commerce. The online consumer behavior typology suggests that people engage in online activities to fulfill transactional, informational and social needs. Previous social commerce studies have investigated each of these needs separately. Thus, this study uses Trust theory and Users and Gratifications theory to develop a research model that covers all the online consumer behavior typology to explain intention to adopt social commerce. The study found that trust related factors such as privacy, security, word of mouth quality and competency of referees encourages individuals to engage in social commerce. Also, information quality, familiarity, the cool and new trend of social commerce, and subjective norms positively influence intention to engage in social commerce.