Title: Positive word-of-mouth for mobile location-based service retail apps usage

Authors: Ju-Young M. Kang; Kim K.P. Johnson

Addresses: Department of Family and Consumer Sciences, University of Hawaii at Manoa, 110 Miller Hall, 2515 Campus Rd., Honolulu, HI 96822, USA ' Department of Design, Housing, and Apparel, University of Minnesota, 240 McNeal Hall, 1985 Buford Ave., St. Paul, MN 55108, USA

Abstract: Mobile location-based service (LBS) retail apps, a prominent web 3.0 trend, offer customers reward opportunities when they physically walk into stores or scan the barcodes of certain products using mobile cameras. The purpose of our study was to examine: 1) whether m-internet users' characteristics were related to perceived multidimensional benefits such as conditional epistemic benefit, social self-concept benefit, emotional benefit, and functional benefit; 2) whether perceived multidimensional benefits were related to positive word-of-mouth (WOM) behaviours relative to mobile LBS retail apps. Data were collected from US female m-internet users (n = 901). Structural equation modelling was employed to test the proposed model. Conditional epistemic benefit, social self-concept benefit, emotional benefit, and functional benefit affected positive WOM behaviours relative to mobile LBS retail apps. Economic orientation, mobile affinity, and recreational orientation all had an indirect influence on positive WOM behaviours, mediated by perceived multidimensional benefits.

Keywords: affinity; economic orientation; mobile LBS; location-based services; perceived benefits; recreational orientation; retail apps; positive WOM; word-of-mouth; app usage; m-services; mobile services; female users; women users; USA; United States; conditional epistemic benefit; social self-concept benefit; emotional benefit; functional benefit; structural equation modelling; SEM; m-internet; mobile internet.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMC.2015.072055

International Journal of Mobile Communications, 2015 Vol.13 No.6, pp.599 - 618

Received: 23 Nov 2013
Accepted: 21 Aug 2014
Published online: 30 Sep 2015 *

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