This timely edited collection offers a multidisciplinary perspective on social commerce, a phenomenon that has gained increasing interest over the last 8 years. Investigating how social media can be used to generate value for brands beyond customer relationship purposes, the skilled authors explore how social media users co-create value for businesses, influence other consumers and generate electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM). Providing insights from practitioners and academics, this book goes further than simply exploring e-commerce and social media, and addresses the real relevance of social commerce in today's business landscape. With a selection of contemporary case studies and a Foreword written by Inthefrow's creator, Victoria Magrath, Social Commerce will be an engaging read for those studying consumer behaviour, online marketing, and e-commerce.
This chapter contributes to knowledge by exploring the roots of social commerce (s-commerce) and provides an overview of what s-commerce is and how it may develop in the future. As such, this chapter seeks to:
explore the origins and roots of s-commerce;
examine definitions of s-commerce; and
investigate the potential of the s-commerce concept.
S-commerce remains a relatively new phenomenon with research interest in the topic starting to gain exponential increase from 2004 onwards, with the emergence and popularity of social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter (Wang and Zhang 2012; Lin et al. 2017). To date, the concept lacks a clear-cut definition and can thus be best described as fuzzy, which âpossess two or more alternative meanings and thus cannot be identified or applied reliably by different readers or scholarsâ (Markusen 1999, p. 870; Liang and Turban 2011). The following sections will first review the historic roots and foundations of s-commerce, which allows for providing an explanation as for why it remains fuzzy, before exploring its definitions, and moving on to a future outlook.
The Role of Social Media Today
Today it is almost unthinkable to live a life without smartphones and the internet. We are connected on a 24/7 basis and exchange information on a real time scale with people living almost anywhere in the world. Being online and available implies an opportunity not only to communicate with others, but also to indulge in consumption behaviour wherever we are. This has led to the dot.âcom business idea booming in the 2000s, which saw the creation of a manifold of companies, some of which are still in existence today (e.g. Leiner et al. 1997; Investopia 2018). Continued research and development activities into wireless technologies and electronic devices, as well as improvements made in the area of electronic commerce (e-commerce) have fostered the creation of mobile commerce (m-commerce) (Senn 2000). Consumers now have shopping platforms literally at the tip of their thumb, scroll through providersâ apps, save their favourite products, add them to wish lists, and indulge further in a buy-now-see-now shopping culture. S-commerce goes even further in that it involves a variety of consumer tools to socialise and share commercial-related information (Lin et al. 2017).
Social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest, have further changed the business world (Fraser and Dutta 2008). Companies are no longer broadcasting their messages as a monologue, but are (ideally) actively engaging into a dialogue with their consumers. Businesses can share their videos, blogs, and product information, or even pose questions and polls to encourage responses in an effective and efficient way, reaching a global audience, whilst consumers have the opportunity to share this content or create their own, comment on links, like pictures, or share their concerns instantaneously and in real time. Our world has changed to becoming increasingly transparent, with every action causing an even greater reaction that is broadcasted globally, with everyone watching (e.g. Doherty and Delener 2001; Kaplan and Haenlein 2010).
Origins and Roots of S-commerce
Figure 1.1 provides a visualisation of the key milestones and historic developments leading to the s-commerce concept. The 1970s laid the foundations for s-commerce, with the emergence of the internet or Web 1.0, which was commercialised in the 1990s and gained increased importance in our daily lives (e.g. Leiner et al. 1997; Investopia 2018). It is at the same time that s-commerce was born, with authors (Curty and Zhang 2011; Friedrich 2015) insisting that the roots of s-commerce can be traced back to the late 1990s. Increased investments in technology and its subsequent infrastructure have fostered the creation of Web 2.0 and the development of e-commerce opportunities (Leiner et al. 1997; Lai 2010; Investopia 2018), which allowed Amazon.âcom to ship its first book, which was purchased online, in 1995 (Olenski 2015).
Fig. 1.1
Key milestones in s-commerce development
In a similar vein, research on s-commerce can be traced back to the late 1990s. Nevertheless, the explosive growth of this field of study only started in 2004, the same year in which Facebook and many other social media sites were founded (Lin et al. 2017). According to Lin et al. (2017), the earliest scholarly publication on social commerce was written in 1999, even though the term âsocial commerceâ was first used in this context in 2007. Since then, it has grown proportionally alongside social media research in terms of a number of publications. Zhou et al. (2013) report an increasing trend of publications on s-commerce from 2003 to 2012. Over the last decade, the number of academic publications on s-commerce has grown exponentially (Lin et al. 2017; Zhang and Benyoucef 2016).
A majority of research focusing on s-commerce is contextualised in the area of information technology (e.g. Shanmugan and Jusoh 2014; Wang and Zhang 2012; Zhou et al. 2013), yet lacks application in marketing and management. Yet, past studies predominantly focus on consumer behaviour, for example on customer experience and web design (Busalim and Hussin 2016). Research on s-commerce is almost always underpinned by social-related theories, which indicates the important role of social aspects brought by the social nature of s-commerce (Busalim and Hussin 2016). This is related to customers and the impact of social interactions on purchasing intention or the decision-making process in s-commerce. According to Lin et al. (2017), dominating topics in the s-commerce remit are organisation, advertisement, and word-of-mouth. Despite its high relevance across the entire decision-making and consumption process, the majority of publications on s-commerce centre on the post-purchase phase (Zhang and Benyoucef 2016).
The Concept of S-commerce
Definitions and Characteristics of S-commerce
Broadly speaking, e-commerce refers to any economic activity that is transacted online and encompasses a wide variety of technologies, including, but not limited to e-mail, telephone, and mobile devices (e.g. tablets and mobile phones), and/or social media (Niranjanamurthy et al. 2013). Social media and Web 2.0 (Lai 2010; Lin et al. 2017) have led to the emergence of s-commerce, and facilitated a shift from product-oriented platforms, whi...
