Title: Direct and mediating effects of social media on e-commerce purchase intention: a comparative approach

Authors: Shahzeb Zulfiqar; Fayaz Ahmed

Addresses: IoBM Main Campus Korangi Creek, Korangi Creek, Karachi, Karachi City, Sindh 75190, Pakistan ' IoBM Main Campus Korangi Creek, Korangi Creek, Karachi, Karachi City, Sindh 75190, Pakistan

Abstract: In the recent years, the impact of social media sites (SNS) has been significant on the purchase intention of customers. Specifically talking about e-commerce, there are multiple social media based independent factors that may impact the online buying behaviour. For this paper, we are specifically focusing on trust (T) and perceived usefulness (PU) as mediating variables. The direct impact of social media is compared to mediating impact of social media through these mediating variables. This comparative analysis is applied through the use of SEM-PLS analysis implemented by SmartPLS v.3. In the results, it is observed that the direct impacts of PU, T and SNS are significant. The mediating impact of T is significant and that of PU is not significant. In comparison, trust as a mediating variable has more impact than the direct impact of SNS. This analysis suggests the importance of customer's trust towards e-commerce platforms for better purchase intention.

Keywords: social commerce; social media; e-commerce; technology acceptance model; TAM; SEM-PLS; trust; perceived usefulness; social networking sites; SNS; purchase intention.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBPIM.2022.125171

International Journal of Business Process Integration and Management, 2022 Vol.11 No.1, pp.19 - 25

Received: 17 May 2020
Accepted: 01 Nov 2020
Published online: 01 Sep 2022 *

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