تحقیقات بازرگانی اجتماعی در مورد نقش اعتماد در یک سایت شبکه اجتماعی بر روی اهداف خرید  A social commerce investigation of the role of trust in a social networking site on purchase intentions

1. Introduction Social commerce is the application of Web 2.0 features, such as content generation tools, for the enhancement of users’ interactions in e-commerce (Liang, Ho, Li, & Turban, 2011). The difference between social commerce (e.g. Starbucks Facebook and Toms’ Twitter) and e-commerce (e.g. Alibaba) is that the former involves communities and conversation among members, while the latter mainly focus on individuals and one-to-one interactions to create value (Huang & Benyoucef, 2013). Web 2.0 technologies, as the basis of social media and social networking sites (SNSs, e.g. LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter), facilitates the acquisition of products through supporting users’ interactions and contributions (Liang & Turban, 2011). According to the Financial Times, social commerce usage increased by N500% between 2007 and 2008 and social commerce firms are growing their venture capital financing substantially (Stephen & Toubia, 2010). Social commerce made positive changes internationally as well, as N300 social commerce Korean firms created sales of $300–500 million in 2011 (Kim & Park, 2013). This growing popularity has led to the expansion of investments in social commerce for 88% of businesses (Huang & Benyoucef, 2013). Several retailers (e.g. Armani Exchange, Toms’, and Samsung) and service providers (e.g. insurance, airlines, and banks) successfully used social commerce to enhance their businesses. However, some firms failed in their social commerce strategies (e.g. Walmart) and there have been numerous complaints about trust, security, and privacy in information exchange (Liang & Turban, 2011; Kim & Pak, 2013). Trust – a belief in the reliability, truth, and ability of the exchange party – is recognized as one main reason customers refrain from electronic purchases (e.g. Gefen, 2000). However, given the context of social commerce, users are notified about a product on SNSs and may engage in purchases. Thus, trust in the SNS and embedded content provided by peers could increase the users’ purchase intentions from an e-vendor. Recently Kim & Park (2013) indicated that trust in social commerce firms (e.g. Amazon.com) directly enhanced purchase and word-ofmouth intentions. However, few research papers in the context of social commerce, if any, indicate whether trust in SNSs influences users’ purchase intentions from e-vendors? Moreover, if there is any relationship, which mechanism carries the effects of trust on purchase intentions? Answering these questions and providing explanations for the relationship between trust and purchase intentions from an e-vendor on a SNS, a model is proposed based on three concepts: 1) social commerce information seeking (i.e. acquiring information from the information channels in a social commerce platform); 2) familiarity with a platform (i.e. comprehension of the platform’s features and procedures); and 3) social presence (i.e. the sense of warmth and sociability within the platform). The channels of information exchange have evolved through the emergence of SNSs. Given the context of social commerce, users may seek information about a product through various channels, including peer recommendations, reviews and ratings, and forums and communities (Hajli & Sims, 2015). Despite this, Van Der Heide & Lim (2015) indicated that users familiar with SNSs more likely rely on peer-generated contents, which could motivate their purchase intentions on social commerce platforms. Moreover, information seeking, together with the social presence in SNSs – the feeling of ‘warmth’ and ‘being there’ – could increase users’ purchase intentions.