The impact of the Seller's facial image on consumer purchase behavior in peer-to-peer accommodation platforms

Abstract

Consumers' initial impressions of a seller's facial appearance play a crucial role in influencing purchase behavior. However, the underlying mechanisms by which a seller's facial appearance influences consumer purchase behavior remain unexplored. This study adopted a multimethod approach to explore these questions. First, drawing on the profile pictures of 1240 sellers from the Airbnb peer-to-peer accommodation platform, we investigated the impact of two principal facial attributes (facial attractiveness and facial expressions) on the formation of consumers' initial impressions and their subsequent influence on purchase decisions. Second, we explored the underlying mechanisms through two online experiments. Our findings indicate a U-shaped relationship between sellers' facial attractiveness and consumer purchase behavior. Additionally, we found that facial expressions such as happy, surprise, and sad, influence consumer purchase behavior positively in comparison to neutral expressions. Furthermore, our study demonstrates that the purchase price acts as a moderator of the U-shaped effect of facial attractiveness on consumer purchase behavior, while text sentiment intensity serves as a negative moderator of the impact of facial expressions of consumer purchase behavior. Finally, the study elucidates the influence mechanism of facial attractiveness and facial expressions on consumers' purchasing decisions. These insights provide novel perspectives on the role of sellers' facial attributes and offer valuable references for devising effective marketing strategies and optimizing platform operational services related to the design of seller facial imagery.