Word of mouth habits : the effect of past behaviour on positive electronic word of mouth

Abstract

The ubiquity of the internet and online social platforms has led to social media addiction where people spend significant amounts of time spend creating and consuming content online. Therefore there was need to investigate whether these habitual behaviours of online content creation relate to communications about products and services such as word of mouth. The purpose of this study was to examine whether past word of mouth behaviour can predict future behaviour and whether it can become habitual. An online survey was administered to online users for them to report on how frequently they posted their restaurant experiences and their perceptions of how much they do this automatically. By grouping the respondents into three frequency groups (low, medium, high), the results showed that past word of mouth behaviour predicted future behaviour but only through attitudes towards word of mouth. The results also demonstrated that indeed, positive electronic word of mouth can become habitual, particularly due to people expressing their self-concept as they publicly display their product consumptions. This study concludes by providing recommendations for managers and directs future research on how consumer habits can be leveraged in word of mouth communications.