Research On Value Co-Creation Of Social Commerce Based On User Generated Content

Social commerce, created by the organic combination of social media technology and E-commerce, is an innovative business model. With transformation that customers change from passive receivers of products to active creators and transmitters of value, the value co-creation has become the outstanding feature and core competence of social commerce. Value co-creation behavior of social commerce obtains intensive focus of academy and practitioners. Because social commerce is an emerging phenomenon, the research on value co-creation of social commerce has been the initial stage, and existing studies only aim at the analysis on customer participation and interactive behavior of value co-creation. Little attention is paid on the influence from user generated content which is an important feature of social commerce to value co-creation. With the rise of social commerce, the influence has been increasingly emerging. In view of this, the thesis will analyze value co-creation in social commerce and the process of diffusion and distribution of co-creation value based on user generated content. It plays a deepening or complement role in the development of value co-creation theories and provides decision support of a win-win situation for the social customers, firms and platforms through value co-creation. It can turn social value of social media into business value of customers, firms and platforms.On the basis of related theories, through literature review and background analysis, value co-creation will be divided into value co-creation between customers and value co-creation between customers and retailers. After the discussion of these two kinds of co-creation models, the process and tendency of diffusion and distribution of co-creation value will be discussed and simulated. Details are as follows.（1） Based on the ecology of communication theory framework, value co-creation model between customers in social commerce has been constructed and verified. It describes the significant influence of user generated content which is created by value co-creation between customers to the formation of customers’ communities. The results show that social presence and sociability which are technology features of social commerce have positive impacts on user generated content; social presence and perceived playfulness have positive impacts on trust; The quality and quantity of user generated content have negative influence on the formation of trust; The quality and quantity of user generated content and mutual trust both have positive significant influence on customers’ community formulation. Perceived playfulness negatively moderates the relationships between sociability and user generated content, as well as the relationships between social presence and user generated content, but positively moderates the relationships between social presence and trust.（2） Based on the stimulus-organism-response theory framework, value co-creation model between customers and retailers in social commerce has been constructed and verified. It describes the significant influence of user generated content which is created by value co-creation between customers and retailers to the purchasing intention of customers. The results show that interesting,perceived interactivity and perceived similarity between customers and retailers which are technology features of social commerce have positive impacts on swift Guanxi and trust formation; Trust is positive correlation with swift Guanxi; swift Guanxi has an positive influence on user generated content and further to customers’ purchasing intention. Lastly, the mediation effects of swift Guanxi and user generated content in the model have been verified.（3） In accordance with SIR model of epidemic model, co-creation value diffusion model in social commerce has been constructed and simulated. It describes the user generated content enhances the diffusion of co-creation value. The results show that the density of active spreaders who continue to create user generated content is larger than it of passive spreaders and the propagation delay is longer. The advertisement promotion rate and amplification factor of active spreaders which can be described as the factors of reinforcing user propagating through user generated content stimulate co-creation value diffusion.（4） In accordance with two-sided market theory framework, co-creation value distribution model in social commerce has been constructed and simulated. It describes user generated content affects customers’ self-network externalities and further influences pricing strategies of social platform. The results show that the optimal price which platform charges from customers decreases with the augment of customers’ self-network externalities and probabilities of customers who generate user generated content. The equilibrium price of one side declines with the augment of cross-group externalities and user scale of the other side. The optimal price which platform charges from retailers are positive related with retailers’ self-network externalities.（5） In accordance with research results, corresponding strategies of value co-creation of social commerce are provided respectively from aspects of social customers, retailers and platforms. The purpose is to facilitate multi-win-win situation of social commerce.The innovative points of this thesis are reflected in the following four aspects.（1） Based on the ecology of communication theory framework, value co-creation model between customers in social commerce has been constructed. The results show that user generated content has a significant influence on the formation of customers’ communities and further on the value co-creation between customers.（2） Based on the stimulus-organism-response theory framework, value co-creation model between customers and retailers in social commerce has been constructed. The results show the significant influence of user generated content and swift Guanxi on value co-creation between customers and retailers.（3） According to the features of social media, based on traditional SIR model, co-creation value diffusion SI₁ I₂ R model in social commerce has been constructed. The research finds user generated content of active spreaders who continue to create the user generated content have significant impacts on co-creation value diffusion.（4） Based on two-sided market theory framework, co-creation value distribution model in social commerce has been constructed. The results show that the customers’ self-network externalities resourced from user generated content have significantly impacts on the distribution process of co-creation value of social commerce.