Maximizing Social Presence to Improve Website Loyalty

Abstract

Technology plays a crucial role in the development of customer brand loyalty. However, technological user interface often falls short on major important aspects of business interaction, such as context-based exchange of information and opinions. Adding social networking features to the corporate website is an attempt to mitigate this weakness. This chapter investigates the driving forces of website loyalty, an issue of interest to the businesses deploying social networks as a new technological tool for business promotion. Using Facebook as the target of observation, this study evaluates the effects of social presence and social capital on website loyalty. The analysis reveals a positive influence of social presence on all three (structural, relational, and cognitive) dimensions of social capital. Further, both the relational and cognitive dimensions of social capital show positive influence on the website loyalty. These findings have practical implications for company seeking to cultivate brand loyalty via website design and management.