In recent years, with the continuous development of technological innovation and the maturity of the Internet, the social business era integrating shopping, interaction, sharing, communication, and publicity can better meet the psychological needs of ...
In recent years, with the continuous development of technological innovation and the maturity of the Internet, the social business era integrating shopping, interaction, sharing, communication, and publicity can better meet the psychological needs of consumers than traditional e-commerce. Nowadays, User Generated Content (UGC) plays a very important role in social business. UGC continues to provide consumers with the latest information or interesting content. In this process, consumers can not only get convenience and happiness, but also save time and money. Consumers can use UGC content to obtain the information they need, which is of great help to consumers’ purchasing decisions. So far, although there have been many studies on the characteristics of the social business environment, there are not many research topics based on UGC characteristics. Therefore, this study aims to explore how the characteristics based on UGC affect consumers’ purchasing intentions. In addition, Chinese generation-Z consumers were selected as research subjects because they are a very active group in social commerce. In this study, the stimuli-organism-response (S-O-R) model is used to analyze the research model of the influence of UGC characteristics on the purchase intention of social e-commerce, and in this process, the perceived value is set as the intermediary variable. The results show that the reliability, entertainment, and usefulness of the content will influence the purchase intention. In addition, perceived value does not mediate between usefulness and purchase intention, or between entertainment and purchase intention. This study may help enterprises or self-employed households to understand how Chinese generation-Z consumers are influenced by UGC characteristics and how consumers’ willingness to buy is affected.