Assessing hierarchical model of word of mouth in social media: its implication for entrepreneurs
Ira Siti Sarah*, Dwi Suhartanto, Tintin Suhaeni
Business Administration Department, Politeknik Negeri Bandung, Indonesia
*ira.sarah[at]polban.ac.id
Abstract
The growth of the Internet and social networking sites made social media word-of-mouth (WOM) has the power to reach more people and is therefore perceived as the most efficient and effective tool for business entrepreneurs for advertising and publicity of their products and services. However, there is lack of consensuses on how to develop strategic social media campaign due to the dynamics of activities based on the platforms. To fill this gap, this study developed an instrument to measure social media WOM activities and test the relationship between these activities using partial least square (PLS). The empirical data was collected via questionnaires, where the target group is 316 college students, aged 18-24. The finding confirmed the hierarchical relationship of social media WOM activities, i.e. “consuming” strongly lead to “contributing” and “creating” activities, and “contributing” influenced “creating” activity. This research has a potential impact to help entrepreneurs who use social media to maintain their relationships with consumers. It is important to administer the three social media WOM activities simultaneously to achieve a consistent social media presence. Experimental and incomplete social media utilization that has been practiced by most entrepreneurs to this day will spare social media marketing full potential.
Keywords: social media activities; social media marketing; word of mouth (WOM); consumer-online-brand-related-activities (COBRAs)
Topic: Entrepreneurship & Technopreneurs