Solving the product uncertainty hurdle in social commerce: The mediating role of seller uncertainty

Abstract

Social commerce, which combines the transactional side of e-commerce with social interactions, has grown in popularity throughout the last years. Despite the fact that the issue of uncertainty in e-commerce has been extensively discussed, little is known about the mechanisms that customers of social commerce employ to lessen their perceptions of uncertainty. The role of various factors, including return policy leniency, information quality, seller popularity, seller reputation, and number of positive comments, in product uncertainty in social commerce is still little understood. Additionally, the social commerce literature indicates that more research is required on the mediating role of seller uncertainty. According to the empirical evidence from 471 customers, return policy leniency, information quality, seller popularity, seller reputation, and number of positive review comments all have significant negative effects on seller uncertainty. In addition, the results demonstrate that seller uncertainty partially mediates the relationships between these factors and customers’ perceptions of product uncertainty in social commerce. These findings reveal important implications for both practice and theory.