Exploring the link between
social media use, social
media behaviors, and
levels of intention to make
online purchases
This dissertation was written as part of the MSc in e-Business & Digital Marketing at
the International Hellenic University and aims to examine the factors that influence the
online purchase intention on social media.
The advent of Web 2.0 technologies, as well as the rising number of users that
access the Internet and own a smartphone, have led to a new technological disruption
in which social media play a key role. Nowadays, more and more users and firms join
social media for socializing, entertainment, price comparison, shopping, and various
other purposes. The buying decision-making process has been mitigated in the digital
world and new influential factors on the online purchase intention have emerged. For
this reason, this study investigates the social media behavioral, social media usage, and
demographic variables that influence the online purchase intention in Greece. The fo cus on the Greek context was made due to the limited research on the specific field.
Hence, this study can enrich the current literature and scale the results of other stud ies revealing useful insights. As for its outcomes, it was observed that each of the
online trust, engagement, positive and negative electronic word-of-mouth behaviors
variables have a positive relationship to the online purchase intention. Thus, it is of
great importance for marketers and companies to consider them when they design
their marketing strategies in social media. Additionally, the interrelationships of these
behavioral variables, as well as the influence of the different groups of each of the so cial media usage and demographics variables on online purchase intention are investi gated. Although this study provides useful insights into the social media's influential
factors on the intention of users to buy online, several limitations need to be consid ered. In fact, the small and not sufficiently representative sample used in this study
and the limited and not up-to-date data that were found in the literature regarding the
Greek population, increase the need for further research in order for the results to be
cross-validated.
Collections
Show Collections