This Is AuburnElectronic Theses and Dissertations

Factors Influencing Consumers' Use of Retailer's Facebook Pages: Application of the Technology Acceptance Model

Date

2013-11-05

Author

Gu, Siming

Type of Degree

thesis

Department

Consumer Affairs

Abstract

Most of the top Internet retailers use Facebook to acquire insights about their customers and to communicate their marketing strategies. However, no published work has used the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) to examine factors influencing consumers’ beliefs in the context of retailers’ Facebook pages and their intent to use Facebook. The purpose of this study was to investigate factors influencing consumers’ beliefs (perceived usefulness and perceived enjoyment) about using retailers’ Facebook pages and their continued intention to use retailers’ Facebook based on TAM. A total of 239 usable data was collected from college students enrolled in courses at Auburn University using an online survey. The results of stepwise multiple regression analysis showed that perceived usefulness and perceived enjoyment significantly influenced continued intention to use retailers’ Facebook pages. In addition, the findings showed that the significant predictors of consumers’ perceived usefulness were information quality, interactivity, sense of community, and entertainment, while the significant predictors of consumers’ perceived enjoyment were information quality, sense of community, and entertainment. The findings of this study provide retailers with important insights to develop promotional strategies to communicate with their customers through Facebook. However, this study is limited due to the sample used; because this study used college students as a sample, the findings of this study may not be generalizable to other consumer groups.