THE EFFECT OF SOCIAL MEDIA NETWORKS' QUALITY ON CONSUMER SATISFACTION: EMPIRICAL STUDY.

• Author: Ashour, Kawther
• Position: Report

INTRODUCTION

Social media networks became the dominating medium for digital communication and it greatly affects the marketing environment (Gretzel & Dinhopl, 2014). They became increasingly important considering their influence on consumer markets (Jaffe, 2010). In light of that, organizations started using social networks to learn about consumers' level of satisfaction with their products or services (Poynter, 2010). Satisfaction is a fundamental element in any long-lasting and successful business relationship with a consumer (Balasubramanian, Konana, & Menon, 2003).

Companies now are more capable of attracting new consumers and maintaining old ones if they reach a good level of consumer satisfaction; and with it they achieve better competitiveness and increase profit (Wilson, Zeithaml, Bitner & Gremler, 2008). The more satisfied a consumer is, the more loyal he or she becomes; and he or she can act as a very affective marketer who influences his or her community through social media. Companies now attempt to create online communities and encourage users to spread positive word of mouth through social media in order to build long-term relationships with consumers (Trusov, Bucklin, & Pauwels, 2009).

Because social media networks have influence on its users and the dire need for companies and institutions to adapt to the new electronic reality, companies and institutions use their potential to overcome its challenges in a high competitive globalized world. Therefore, this study investigates the effect of the three quality dimensions of social media networks (information quality, system quality, and service quality) on consumer satisfaction for the clothing sector in the city of Amman, Jordan.

BACKGROUND OF THIS STUDY

Social Media Networks

Social media networks are described as media that facilitate the flow of interactive information, user-created content, and cooperation (Elefant, 2011). They can be defined as technology applications that emerged with the second-generation web services. Social networking and marketing are the tools used to define and analyze conversations to assist participation and involvement in social interaction in communities, and thus consumers (Cavazza, 2008).

Social media proved their ability to increase the amount of interaction and communication between companies and customers or clients (Saperstein & Hastings, 2010). Furthermore, consumers themselves became involved in creating content and sharing opinions, which ultimately influences other users' awareness and the level of loyalty towards a trademark (Blackshaw & Nazzaro, 2006).

In addition, social media affected consumer behavior from the early stage of information collection to the final stage of post-purchase behavior, such as complaints posted against a product or service and other forms of consumer behavior (Mangold & Faulds, 2009). Social media also affected general internet use (Ross et al., 2009; Laroche, Habibi, & Richard, 2013).

Social media gained more credibility and became a source of information that is more accurate than information taken directly from relevant companies. As consumers began interacting with each other and receiving positive or negative feedback about a product or service, virtual communities started to profoundly influence consumers' purchase decisions (Darban & Li, 2012).

It is clear that the number of internet users has increased in the past few years. Studies have shown that 32.7% of Jordanian households own personal computers, 70% of them are subscribed to internet services, and 99% of users access the internet through their smart phones (Ministry of Information and Communications Technology, Department of Statistics, 2015) and they use social media to interact with friends and exchange information and opinions.

In a rapidly changing world, there is no doubt the social media is constantly progressing. Statistics have shown that the number of Facebook users in the Arab region reached 76 million in 2016. Facebook users in Jordan reached 4.8 million in the same year (Internet world stats, 2016). According to these statistics, 93% of internet users also use social media, with Facebook being their favorite networking site (79.9% of users in Jordan). Meanwhile, 32.9% of users in Jordan use Instagram, 22.3% use Twitter, and 90.7% use WhatsApp (The Jordan Times, 2016).

Social Media Networks' Quality Dimensions

The social media networks' quality dimensions consist of information quality, system quality, and service quality. Here is a brief description of all the above-mentioned dimensions.

* Information quality: content that is personal, complete, relevant, easy to understand and safe. This is to ensure that transactions are initiated by potential buyers or suppliers through the web and returning to the site on regular basis (DeLone & McLean, 2003).

* System quality: it measures the required features of the e-commerce system such as user friendliness, availability, reliability, adaptability and response time (e.g. during downloads), and they are rated by users of the e-commerce system (DeLone & McLean, 2003).

* Service quality: the overall support provided by the service provider. Service quality becomes increasingly important when users become clients for the organization because lack of support will lead to losing clients, thus loss in sales (DeLone & McLean, 2003).

Consumer Satisfaction

Consumer satisfaction is the behavior of consumers that results from comparing the expected quality of service or product with the actual quality perceived by the consumer (Oliver, 1999; Parasuraman, Zeithaml & Berry, 1988). If performance meets expectations, consumer satisfaction is realized (Armstrong & Kotler, 2009).

Social Media Networks and Consumer Satisfaction

Many companies seized the benefits of social media networks diversity and enormous growth to learn about the needs of potential consumers and to reach the highest level possible of consumer satisfaction. They also managed to follow up on the achieved level of satisfaction after they deliver their products by means of mutual dialogue (Poynter, 2010).

Social media networks use indirect ways to influence consumer satisfaction through faster and easier tracking of consumer reactions, feelings and thoughts, and through effectively handling complaints and improving public participation (Viot & Washed, 2008). This could psychologically boost consumer's sense of satisfaction by creating social links to it and showcasing other people's satisfaction with the product or company. This pushed companies to increase their communication operations and to enhance their relationship with consumers to gain their satisfaction and loyalty.

CONCEPTUAL RESEARCH MODEL

In the world of business, companies face major challenges arising from high competitiveness, changeful consumer demands, continued technological evolution, increasing globalization and wide use of social media networks in all sectors (Jaffe, 2010). With the current rapid growth of social networks and their increased relevance to the fields of business and marketing, achieving consumer satisfaction becomes a crucial part of marketing results due to its great impact on profitability (Luo & Homburg, 2007).

The research problem focuses on studying the impact of social media networks' quality on consumer satisfaction particularly in the clothing sector in Amman. Using the updated DeLone and McLean information systems success model and in order to assess the quality of social media networks, three variables will be taken into consideration to construct the study model as shown below in Figure1 information quality, system quality and service quality provided through social media networks (DeLone & McLean, 2003; Turban et al., 2012).

The research problem can be illustrated by asking and attempting to answer the following questions:

Question 1: From the point of view of clothing sector consumers in Amman, what is the level of social media networks quality in terms of information, system and services provided?

Question 2: How satisfied are consumers who use social media networks to browse the clothing sector in Amman?

Question 3: How significant is the impact of information quality, system quality and service quality provided through social media networks on the satisfaction of clothing sector consumers in Amman?

HYPOTHESES

This study investigates the effect of the quality of...