Information and Communication Technologies; National Research Council Canada

English

Conference publication

14th Annual International Conference on Electronic Commerce, August 7-8, 2012, Singapore

ICEC 2012: International Conference on Electronic Commerce

2012

95-98

20794316

Currently social networks are used by buyers to become more aware of sellers and their goods. Increasingly, they are used with three other market mechanisms: Buyers use social networks to form buyer groups that leverage purchasing power. Sellers incentivize buyers to post recommendations on social media. Sellers or buyers compose compatible items into bundles with increased value and reduced price. In this paper we study the potential e ects of social networks on these mechanisms. For comprehensive and consistent coverage, we simulate combinations of these mechanisms, using published metrics for authenticity. Our results show seller pro tability increases with the use of social networks applied to all possible combinations.