Social Commerce:The Effect of Trust in Seller on Consumer’s Continuous Purchase Intention: Mediating Role of Brand Trust

Objective: Today, e-commerce plays a significant role in the revenue of countries around the world.With the spread of the global Internet, this issue has doubled. On the other hand, social media have become very popular among people, which has increased the number of Websites Search Traffic (which is defined as site visitors per day) . This has increased the activity of people in social commerce. For this reason, companies active in this field have started a tough competition to attract users and their trust. This study intends to evaluate the effect of Trust in seller on the consumer's continuous purchase intention in the C۲C social commerce with the mediating role of brand trust and the moderating role of Promotion. Methodology: The population of the study is the buyers and sellers of the Sheypoor social commerce platform. A total of ۲۵۰ people were selected as a statistical sample using the structural equation sampling method. Data collection was done using an electronic questionnaire. After removing the unacceptable questionnaires, ۲۵۰ questionnaires were approved for analysis. Data analysis was performed using the partial least squares (PLS) method and SPSS ۲۶ and Smart-PLS ۳ softwares. Findings: Findings showed that trust in the seller has a positive and significant effect on the consumer's intention to buy continuously in the social trade of the consumer with the consumer. Also, brand trust plays a mediating role in the relationship between seller trust and the consumer's continued purchase intention. The moderating role of promotion in the relationship between seller trust and brand trust was not confirmed. Conclusion: Today, creating an intelligent trading platform is not concealed for any business. Creating a sense of trust between seller and buyer in such a business is essential. Accordingly, companies will be able to use trust-building mechanisms to increase the likelihood of the consumer intending to repurchase and, ultimately, to continue to buy. The results of this research can also help more businesses that are just entering the field of e-commerce. Based on these results, managers of these businesses can see a significant increase in their consumers by taking advantage of factors affecting the trust in seller, as well as techniques to increase site traffic and then conversion rates which is defined as the conversion rate of site visitors to buyers. The results of this study show that trust in seller has a positive and significant effect on the consumer's continuous purchase intention in the C۲C social commerce. Therefore, companies operating in the digital platform must identify the factors affecting the trust in seller in the industry in which they operate and then, apply them in their dealings with the consumers.

Keywords:

Brand Trust , Continuous Purchase Intention , Promotion , Trust in Seller.