Social Commerce: Factors that stimulate sellers to engage in C2C commercial activity on social networking platforms

Abstract: Along with the increased popularity and wide usage of social networking platforms, such as Facebook, social commerce is emerging as an important category of e-commerce. In this study, we refined one type of C2C social commerce naming as C2C social commerce on social networking platforms (C2CSNP). It refers to that online users conduct both online marketing and selling activities of products/ services on social networking platforms. Taking into account that this type is rapidly growing and could have chance to replace other types of social commerce, it is essential to understand what stimulates users to engage in this type of social commerce. So the main objective of this study is to identify factors that stimulate users (sellers) of social networking platforms to engage in social commerce on those platforms. To achieve this goal, we generated an initial theoretical framework by reviewing and analysing literature, which was related to social commerce. Based on this framework, ten semistructured interviews were conducted to the users who had selling experiences on three popular social networking platforms – Facebook, VKontakte and WeChat. Through the interpretation and analysis of empirical findings, we enriched our research framework, which covers three aspects – economic, social and technological aspects. Although the factors of economic and technological aspects play an important role for some respondents, we still highlight the significant role of social factors. The key social factors and their supporting factors, such as social support (informational support and emotional support), reputation, opportunities, etc., could greatly contribute to the improvement and development of social commerce platforms. This research supplements the existing research on social commerce, in terms of the type of C2C social commerce on social networking platforms, as well as sheds light on the industry of e-commerce.