ABSTRACT
Objective:
the present study analyzes the relationship between online reviews and consumer trust in online stores, considering the conjoint effects of the characteristics of online reviews and product offers in the social commerce context.
Methods:
the study is characterized as a laboratory experiment that simulated the environment of an online store considering different scenarios, totaling 602 cases for analysis.
Results:
the results indicate that the relationship established between the consumer and the reviewers moderates the relationship between reviews and trust, suggesting that positive and negative reviews from friends and acquaintances affect the consumer’s trust more than those reviews made from strangers. However, this effect is not always significant, depending on the price offered. Still, the type of the product moderates the effect of the online reviews on trust when the store displays higher prices than the competition. In such cases, the impact of reviews on trust is more intense in high-value product advertisements.
Conclusions:
the study can help managers and website developers create more appropriate processes and strategic alternatives in the social commerce context, based on a better understanding of the relationships among the variables studied in this research.
Keywords:
e-commerce; social commerce; trust; online word of mouth; social networks
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