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Over the last few decades, microfinance industry is argued to have played a constructive role in alleviating poverty level and providing the underprivileged with access to financial services. Statistics from the World Bank reveal that, currently, only 4% of the underprivileged have been served out of the 3 billion+ potential clients. Such results are due to several claims, particularly the operational and financial challenges faced by microfinance institutions (MFIs) in the constant flux inviting more attentions towards its performance. While explicit attention is given by many researchers towards mobile banking and information and communication technology (ICT) in improving the MFIs’ performance, the study on how social media, as a rapidly growing online phenomenon, can impact on the MFIs’ performance remains scarce. As such, this study aims to investigate this impact based on four dimensional performance indicators: efficiency, financial sustainability, portfolio quality and outreach.

A model is proposed and tested to ascertain the relationship between social media applications and organisational performance. In so doing, web-based questionnaires have been used to collect data from MFI employees in developing countries. Results reveal a significant influence of the social media over the MFIs’ performance, offering valuable insights into both researchers and practitioners in the domain of microfinance, as well as social media—conforming that the adoption of social media as marketing, advertising and communication tools may significantly improve the MFIs’ performance.

The results demonstrate that there is a positive and significant impact of social media use within microfinance on the key indicators of MFIs. They also show that the highest impact of social media usage within the microfinance is on the portfolio quality. In addition, it was found that marketing and advertising; communication and sales and distribution are the main areas where social media is able to support while social networking websites are the most popular platforms employed in MFIs.

This study adds to the existing literature few theoretical and practical aspects. First, this study developed a model for assessing the value of social media as a new phenomenon within this type of organisation. Second, it offers microfinance sponsors, managers and policy makers with a frame of reference to understand what social media platform can be deployed for each purpose. Third, with the identification of the main MFIs’ performance indicators, this research provided a reference of performance measurement guide for microfinance industry when assessing different technological employment.

With the ever-expanding online shopping, electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) has become a significant factor affecting the consumer decision-making behaviour. This is specially the case when considering Generation Y (Millennials), who are old enough to be independent buyers and young to be almost immersed in online living. This article aims to assess the impact of eWOM on purchase intention by developing a conceptual model of hypotheses encompassing a multitude of factors that may be associated with this relationship.

The researcher investigates what factors impact eWOM credibility and make the consumer may adopt it when making a purchase. To examine our research model, a quantitative approach is employed for this purpose using a sample through online survey from Thailand – where there is a large number portion Generation Y consumer base.

It was found that source style as a visual attribute information is the most significant factor that may impact eWOM credibility in addition to source credibility, argument quality and source homophily, respectively.

From a practical point of view, it helps firms to understand what needs to be taken into consideration when building their marketing strategy.

This is believed to add significant insights into the eWOM literature by identifying its route of impact toward the purchase intention on Generation Y.

The aim of this study is to provide a further understanding of how and when social media (SM) boosts firm performance (FP) by exploring the mediation role of business innovation capabilities (BI) and firm competitiveness (FC) in the link between SM and FP.

This study uses a quantitative approach using small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in emerging market as an empirical field of research. The population of this study is the management level of SMEs and professionals. This study surveyed 425 samples to get primary data for quantitative analysis. This study uses Smart PLS SEM version 3.3.2 to analyze the collected data.

This study found that SM directly and indirectly affects FP through BI and FC. Besides, BI and FC mediated the relationship between SM and FP.

The originality of this study lies in the operationalization of an unexplored integrated framework using SMEs in emerging market as an empirical field of research from the perspective of combination of diffusion of innovations theory and resource advantage theory. This study thus provides a new approach to the potential of SM for business innovation capabilities oriented toward sustainability. Drawing on the findings of this study, theoretical and managerial implications are proposed which may be of great interests to business practitioners, business owners, business directors and managers to operate their organizations efficiently through making optimal use of SM platforms.

eWOM is a very useful tool that is widely used nowadays to make a purchase decision. One of the sectors where this tool is very present is the gastronomic sector and Peru is no stranger to this gastronomic take-off. As a part of this take-off, Nikkei or Peruvian-Japanese cuisine have gained plenty of attention through digital social platforms, with a significant number of users relying on eWOM to determine which is their best purchase option; nevertheless, there is a lack of local investigations that addresses a correlation between eWOM and purchase intention in this type of restaurants. With the last statement, this study aims to determine the influence of eWOM on the purchase intention of consumers of Nikkei restaurants in Lima, Peru.

A quantitative descriptive and causal explanatory research was conducted, using the Information Acceptance Model (IACM) to test the purpose of the study. A total of 385 surveys were obtained and processed in SmartPLS.

The results show that consumers of Nikkei restaurants in Metropolitan Lima are mostly guided by the eWOM that is on social media to make a purchase decision. In addition, information usefulness is the eWOM dimension that most influences purchase intention. Finally, it was found that the credibility of the eWOM does not influence the information usefulness, which could be due to the distrust of the sources and the anonymity of the eWOM.

The present investigation identified that certain dimensions of the IACM does not influence their hypothesized counterparts, such as credibility and attitude towards information over information usefulness; circumstances that may conduct to other local studies based on the IACM applied to other type of restaurants to observe if there is some type of variation in the results obtained of both hypotheses.

From a practical point of view, the results obtained are valuable for social media marketers and generally digital marketing professionals, which by themselves provide a framework that assures a better understanding about the impact of eWOM in the purchase intention of Nikkei Restaurant consumers.

As the potential for this research to impact society in visible ways, it identifies how current individuals in a certain time and location, tend to act towards information obtained in social media or specialised forums; as well as how the characteristics of this information could affect their final purchase decision.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the first articles to study the influence of eWOM on purchase intention in the gastronomic sector in Peru, a country famous for its gastronomy. In this way, experts and professionals in this field will be able to generate knowledge of this tool, as well as generate strategies to improve sales of Nikkei restaurants and in general within the gastronomy industry in Peru.

To better understand continuities and changes in consumer behaviour, it is also important to examine the original antecedents of unified theory of acceptance and use of technology 2 (UTAUT2). Studying Generation Y is crucial for developing competitive online marketing strategies, as Generation Y plays a substantial role in online purchases. Therefore, this study aims to examine the actual use of small business websites based on the UTAUT2 among Generation Y.

A total of 375 valid questionnaires were collected via a systematic sampling among Generation Y in Canada. All participants in the study had at least a high school education, were internet and computer literate, and had purchased a good/service from the retail websites of Canadian small businesses.

The results show performance expectancy, hedonic motivation, social influence and habit have significant effects on behavioural intentions. The habit and behavioural intentions also have significant effects on actual usage of small businesses’ retail websites. Additionally, this study supported the significant difference between male and female UTAUT2 models.

The study examines how small retail businesses can attract and retain Generation Y customers by improving their website’s performance. Performance expectancy, hedonic motivation and social influence are significant factors in determining behavioral intention. Small businesses can enhance their website usability, design and content to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty. Hedonic motivation is crucial for Generation Y customers, who seek pleasure and excitement when visiting websites. Social influence is crucial for male customers, whereas performance expectancy, hedonic motivation and habit are more important for female customers. The study also suggests that Canadian governments should encourage online purchasing to increase the usage of small retail business websites.

This study provided few valuable insights into small businesses’ retail websites behavioural intentions and actual usage between males and females in Canada.