The Impact of Social Presence on Consumer Purchase Intention in Live Commerce: Mediating Effect of Customer Stickiness
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Abstract
This study examined the influence of social presence on consumers' purchase intentions in live commerce settings, focusing on the mediating role of customer stickiness. While live commerce experienced exponential growth, reaching a transaction volume of 4.9 trillion yuan in China's market in 2023, limited understanding remained regarding how dimensions of social presence affected consumer behavior in this context. Drawing upon social presence theory, the research proposed a theoretical framework that assessed the direct effects of social presence dimensions (awareness, emotional, and cognitive) on purchase intention and the mediating effect of customer stickiness. Data were collected from 389 live commerce consumers through a structured questionnaire survey, and correlation analysis, regression analysis, and bootstrapping methods were employed to test the hypothesized relationships. The results revealed that all three dimensions of social presence positively influenced purchase intention, with emotional presence showing the most substantial effect (β = 0.352, p < 0.01), followed by cognitive presence (β = 0.296, p < 0.05) and awareness presence (β = 0.275, p < 0.05). Additionally, customer stickiness significantly mediated these relationships, with the most substantial mediating effect observed in the communication aspect of social presence (0.159). These findings contributed to theory and practice by providing insights into how social presence shaped purchase behavior in live commerce environments and offering practical implications for e-commerce enterprises and live-streaming platforms to enhance their operational effectiveness.
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