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The purpose of this paper is to investigate social shopping deals and their impacts on review metrics at an online review site, Yelp and to compare the review metrics of the restaurant businesses and the health and wellness businesses to understand how social shopping deals affects them.

This study adopts a multiple regression model to analyse the effect of seven independent variables on the dependent variable, the growth rate of reviews which is a proxy of sales growth. This sample consisted of the review data of 134 merchants which offered social shopping deals at Groupon in 2011. The online review data of these merchants were collected in 2015 to analyse the relationship between the deals and the grow rate of the reviews.

For the restaurant businesses, there is a positive persuasive effect of Groupon customers’ review score on the growth rate of the reviews and consequently on the sale growth. For the health and wellness businesses, there are a positive persuasive effect of the regular customers’ review score on the growth rate of the reviews and a negative awareness effect of the number of Groupon reviews on the growth rate of the reviews. The review data also show that the Groupon customers of the health and wellness businesses are three times more likely to post their reviews than those of the restaurant businesses.

First, while the author limited the study to the seven independent variables, additional variables may exist. These additional variables may also influence the number of reviews, too. Future research needs to identify such variables to build a comprehensive model. Second, future research needs to address other types of businesses, such as education and entertainment, and compare differences between them. Third, while the study focussed on the review score and the number of reviews, a more in-depth analysis of the comments using sentiment analysis and social network analysis may shed additional insights on their review activities.

Despite the potential significance of customers’ reviews about social shopping deals, the critical mass of empirical studies still lacks in this area. The study contributes to the literature of this field by investigating the effect of social shopping deals on the customers’ online reviews. This study provides practical guidance for the improvement of online reviews about social shopping deals.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships between five characteristics of social shoppers’ online reviews (the number of all reviews made by a reviewer, the number of friends of a reviewer, the review score, the number of review words, and images/photos) and the usefulness, funniness, and coolness to viewers for the restaurant businesses and the health and wellness businesses.

A sample of 1,114 online reviews of social shoppers was collected from Yelp.com. A zero-inflated Poisson regression was used due to a high number of zero votes in the dependent variables for usefulness, funniness, and coolness. The regression identified the review characteristics that are strongly associated with the number of usefulness, funniness, and coolness votes made by viewers.

The analysis shows that for the health and wellness businesses, all three dependent variables (usefulness, funniness, and coolness) have the number of reviews, the number of friends, and the number of words as significant independent variables. The results indicate that a reviewer who has more friends and is more experienced in giving reviews is likely to be more influential in generating a perceived value of the online review. The analysis also shows that all three dependent variables of the restaurant businesses have the number of words as a significant independent variable. It is found that there is a negative relationship between the review score and the usefulness votes for both restaurant businesses and health and wellness businesses. The effect of the review score on the coolness votes was not consistent.

This study is the first research attempt in understanding social shoppers’ online reviews and their usefulness, funniness, and coolness to viewers, and therefore makes significant contributions to research and practice. The comparison was made between restaurant businesses and health and wellness businesses. The result indicates that for the health and wellness businesses, managers need to pay attention to social shoppers with a high number of friends and high number of words in a review. It is also noted that it is necessary to analyze review characteristics separately for each business type. However, as is typical in many empirical studies, this study is not without limitations. While the author limited the analysis of social shoppers’ online reviews to the five characteristics, additional variables may influence the number of votes, too. This study is limited to social shoppers’ reviews and the findings may not be generalized to regular customers’ online reviews. Future research should also examine whether similar results can be obtained at other review sites such as TripAdvisor and Zagat.

Despite the potential significance of social shoppers’ online reviews, the critical mass of empirical studies still lacks in this area. For a more comprehensive interpretation of review characteristics, this study develops hypotheses based on the literature review on electronic word of mouth and source credibility models and investigates the effect of the five review characteristics on the viewers’ perceived usefulness, funniness, and coolness. Unlike previous studies focused on a single business type, this study compares the results obtained for restaurant businesses and health and wellness businesses and demonstrates that viewers in each business type respond differently to social shoppers’ online reviews.

The study investigates how the congruence of online deal popularity and star rating influences service quality expectation in online group buying (OGB) websites. It also investigates the role of authenticity perceptions of online cues.

Two experiments are used to assess the effects of congruence between deal popularity and star rating on service quality expectation for service deals in an OGB website.

The findings suggest that a combination of congruently high deal popularity and high star rating has a stronger effect on expected service quality than a combination of congruently low cues. The findings further suggest that expected service quality is greater under the combination of high deal popularity and low star rating than the combination of low deal popularity and high star rating, showing the differences between incongruent cue combinations. The findings also show the moderating effect of consumer authenticity perceptions of cues on the expected service quality.

The novel contribution of the study is to extend cue congruence theory to explain how congruent online information cues and the consumers' authenticity perceptions of the cues influence consumers' judgment of online deals. The contribution is validated empirically in the context of OGB. The findings advance current knowledge concerning how consumers use online information cues.

Recent substantial developments of consumer-to-consumer social commerce platforms (C2C-SCPs) emboldened consumers/users to be involved as sellers. Considering C2C social networks that privilege local reach, this paper aim to explore how the practice-based view informs non-professional sellers' involvement.

Underpinned by data from 29 semi-structured interviews with non-professional sellers on Kaskus, one of the largest local Indonesian C2C-SCPs, the study reveals the emergence of a novel structural practice that we call casual selling.

The findings show that casual selling allows non-professional sellers' involvement in C2C-SCPs through three broad categories of practices: priming oneself, producing commercial operations and valuing others. Within these three categories, non-professional sellers are found to generate both personal and collective involvement along nine situated market practices.

This paper adds to previous research by introducing the practice-based view to social commerce literature. In doing so, it deals with the under-investigated seller's perspective and activities that prevail in C2C-SCPs.

In C2C-SCPs, casual selling constitutes a distinct mode of involvement in social commerce in which established professional selling standards are suspended. As a structural practice, it entices non-professional sellers to consider a wider variety of situations in which they are in dialogue with other individuals (buyers and sellers) to shape s-commerce potential. In doing so, C2C-SCP users draw on a dynamic intertwining between digital technology and the socio-cultural environment surrounding s-commerce.

This study aims to investigate the insights on how international customer behavior is impacted toward online customer review (OCR) by the mediating effects of social and personal norms in the varied cultural context. The study also investigates how support of peer influence could moderate the effect of OCR.

This study has used socialization theory, congruity theory and theory of planned behavior along with studies of different literature to develop a conceptual model. The conceptual model has been validated using PLS-SEM analysis with survey considering 306 usable respondents. The mediating effects and moderating impacts have been analyzed by mediating analysis process (process tool) and multi group analysis, respectively.

The results of the model, with 62% explanative power, highlight that social norm acts as a strong mediating variable to impact OCR intention while peer influence acts as a vital moderator to impact OCR intention.

The theoretical model provides a solid foundation to future researchers for further study in this field. This study also provides the practitioners a unique opportunity towards understanding customer motivation for OCR intention. Accordingly, practitioners could bring some transformational changes in their organizations for getting better reviews from the customers.

This study develops a unique theoretical model with high explanative power. Very few studies have ventured in this field. This study has added value to the body of literature on consumer behavior as well as individualism. Furthermore, this study has developed some of the novel relationships between different factors such as individualism, peer influence, international consumers, social norm and so on in the context of OCR which is one of the unique contributions of this study.

The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of online customer reviews (OCRs) and electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) on customers’ purchase intention (PUI). This study also investigates the cultural differences between the customers in India and UK as regards the influence of OCR and customers’ PUIs.

This study has used socialisation theory, theory of reasoned action, congruity theory and expectation value theory, along with the existing literature to develop the conceptual model. The theoretical model has been validated using the PLS-SEM technique on a survey involving 305 and 280 respondents for India and UK, respectively.

The findings highlight that gender has no effect on UK customers’ PUIs, whereas age and gender have considerable impacts on Indian customers’ PUIs.

The study only examines the cross-cultural difference between a European country (UK) and an Asian country (India). Also, since the sample size is low, the findings did not represent a generic view.

The proposed model has provided important inputs to the organisations to understand consumer behaviour particularly the study would help marketing departments to formulate their marketing strategies regarding OCR and customers’ PUI.

This study is unique in understanding the implications of OCR and their influence on customer purchase decisions of UK customers and India’s customers. This study also helps to understand the impact of age and gender on OCR and PUIs.

The purpose of this paper is to examine what influence travelers’ adoption of online reviews, and whether the online reviews will influence their travel planning decisions.

Data were collected from 193 respondents from eWOM websites and analyzed using structural equation modeling.

The results revealed that eWOM has a significant influence on travel decisions. Furthermore, travelers were willing to adopt information from eWOM and this information was useful in their travel planning and decisions. Gender and time spent on online reviews were found to affect travel planning and decisions. Travelers also found that the reviews and issues raised in eWOM had credibility and were of good quality.

The study was not able to incorporate all factors which may be relevant to this study and so further theoretical development may be necessary to develop the conceptual model. The sample size, while adequate, can be expanded further.

Operators and administrators of eWOM can use these findings to develop more user-friendly interfaces so that more positive reviews and sales can be generated.

The results showed that travelers who adopt the information in eWOM will, in turn, use eWOM in their travel planning. This confirms the importance of eWOM and travelers in general will translate their pre-travel decisions into actual travel planning.

This research extended existing eWOM and information system adoption studies and focused on the travel planning context. This research validated the significant roles of eWOM argument quality and credibility in predicting the information usefulness of eWOM.

The importance of online reviews on online hotel booking has been widely acknowledged. However, not all online reviews affect consumers equally. Compared with common online reviews, key online reviews (KORs) have a greater influence on consumers' decisions and online hotel booking. This study takes the first step to investigate the factors affecting the identification of KORs and the role of KORs in online hotel booking.

To test the research hypotheses, this study develops a crawler to obtain 551,600 online reviews of 650 hotels in ten representative large cities in China. This study first uses a binary logistic regression to identify KORs by combining review content quality and reviewer characteristics and then uses a log-regression model to investigate the role of KORs in online hotel booking.

This study mined the factors affecting the identification of KORs by analyzing review contents and reviewer characteristics. Our results revealed that KORs play a mediating role in the effects of review content and reviewer characteristics on online hotel booking.

This study focuses on KORs, which have received limited attention in research but are important to practitioners. Specifically, this study investigates the antecedents and consequences of KORs. Our results enable hotel managers to manage online reviews effectively, particularly KORs.

The purpose of this study is to segment consumers according to their decision-making styles in the context of social commerce. Additionally, the differences among consumer segments in consumer innovativeness, perceived risk, satisfaction and demographic characteristics are evaluated.

A total of 384 respondents who shopped for restaurant deals through social commerce participated in this study through an online survey. Two-step cluster analyses were used to segment social commerce consumers into groups, using their decision-making styles.

The results showed three types of social commerce consumers of restaurant deals: innovative brand-preferring consumers; realistic consumers; and passive consumers. Innovative brand-preferring consumers chose specific brands and showed the most innovativeness, while realistic consumers and passive consumers were price-conscious and far more cautious in purchasing restaurant deals using social commerce. Passive consumers were, in addition, confused by overchoice. All three consumer groups perceived higher risks to privacy in purchases using social commerce. Passive consumers were especially aware of the risk, while the innovative brand-preferring consumers and the realistic consumers were less concerned about risk. Consumers were especially likely to perceive economic risk, performance risk, social risk, psychological risk, privacy risk and time risk. Innovative brand-preferring consumers were more likely to be innovative and showed a higher level of satisfaction, while passive consumers showed the lowest satisfaction and the least innovativeness.

This study provides additional insights on consumer decision-making styles in the context of social commerce in Korea.

Consumer decision-making styles can help restaurant managers to develop deals tailored to specific types of consumers, as well as create customized products and services.

This study is one of the very few attempts to investigate consumer decision-making styles in social commerce for restaurant deals, so it contributes to the literature on social commerce in the hospitality industry. This study shows that consumer decision-making styles are important in understanding the behavior of social commerce consumers.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the key antecedents of attitude towards electronic deals (e-deals) and factors influencing purchase intention of e-deals. Specifically, perceived value and price consciousness will be tested as antecedents of attitudes towards e-deals. Attitudes towards e-deals, subjective norms, and perceived behavioural control are proposed to have strong influences upon purchase intention. The theory of planned behaviour (TPB) provides the theoretical underpinning of the conceptual framework.

Data were collected through convenience sampling. Overall, 611 valid responses of 780 distributed surveys were collected. Only 426 e-deals users were analysed by using structural equation modelling to test the hypotheses.

It is found that perceived value is a strong predictor of attitudes towards e-deals. Another finding also indicates that attitudes towards e-deals and normative influence positively affect consumers’ purchase intention towards e-deals.

Practitioners are advised to integrate social media (e.g. Facebook or Twitter) and online communities to approach the “leader” to influence new potential consumers to purchase e-deals. It is also important to maintain the good value of e-deals and emphasise the huge benefits of using e-deals to persuade consumers to purchase it.

The originality of this study lies in extending the TPB as a robust measurement to investigate online shopping behaviour in the context of e-deals.