The application of social media has become popular in addition to helping consumers exchange opinions and improve communications, it also brings businesses and brands unlimited business opportunities. Therefore, this study is to understand the factors that influence eWOM credibility. Specifically, this study explores the influence of messages from different social media with different levels of social presence, and the influence of tie strength in different involvement levels. Finally, the importance of the eWOM credibility is discussed. This study uses the blog and Facebook for comparison and to understand their impacts.
This research model is tested to understand how recipients evaluate the eWOM credibility. We conducted a 2 (valence: positive/negative) × 2 (sidedness: two-sided/one-sided) × 2 (social media: Blog/Facebook) × 2 (tie strength: strong/weak) × 2 (involvement: high/low) between-subjects experiment design and measured the level of involvement. The results show that negative eWOM message and two-sided eWOM message produce higher eWOM credibility messages from Facebook have the higher eWOM credibility than those from the Blog moreover, social media will moderate the influence of message valence on the eWOM credibility. The greater tie strength between the sender and the receiver brings the higher eWOM credibility. Finally, this research provides some managerial implications and directions for further research.
