The Impact of Social Media Marketing on Consumer Purchase Intention Towards e-Tailers in Sri Lanka: The Mediating Role of e-Brand Trust

Abstract

The advancement of web 2.0 technology has enabled the businesses to have expanded their operations to the online platform. They are considering using the website's development to promote their businesses in the online world. As a result, businesses will spend a large amount of money on social media marketing to provide customers with more straightforward, faster, and increasingly personalized experiences. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube are pushing marketing companies to use social media marketing in new ways. Social media has penetrated so many people's lives around the world that it has grabbed the attention of marketers, specifically in e-tailers. Brand community, entertainment, interactions and customization were identified as the independent variables through literature. Brand trust was identified as a mediator. In this study, researchers adopted a quantitative research design with a deductive research approach and a convenient sampling method for the data collection. The data was collected in Western provinces from people who are active on social media and are willing to buy the products from an online platform, with a sample size of 384 people. Only 296 of the 384 questions were accepted. The results show that e-brand trust and social media influence the consumers’ purchase intentions significantly. Further, this study reveals the best practices for social media marketing that can be used by e-tailers in Sri Lanka. Moreover, findings of the study can be used to improve the usage of social media marketing for e-tailing.