Virtual ideality vs. virtual authenticity: exploring the role of social signals in interactive marketing

Purpose In the online marketing context, virtual reality (VR) has been used to display products and shopping environment, which effectively enhances the consumer experience. VR technology can not only recreate scenes similar to the real world (virtual authenticity, VA) but also create fictitious and desirable scenes that do not exist in the real world (virtual ideality, VI). The differences between VA and VI in influencing consumers' responses have not been fully understood. In addition, social signals have appeared in VR apps. However, the role of social signals in a VR context has rarely been studied. To fill the gaps in the literature, this study investigates the roles of VA and VI in shaping consumers' responses, as well as whether and how their effectiveness in shaping consumers' responses is influenced by social signals. Design/methodology/approach A VR real estate service platform was selected as the experimental platform, and two experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses. The ANOVAs and regressions were used for data analysis. Findings Results show that VA leads to a higher level of perceived diagnosticity than VI, whereas VI leads to a higher level of inspiration than VA; perceived diagnosticity and inspiration positively affect visit intention. Furthermore, the relationship between consumers' perceived diagnosticity, inspiration and visit intention is moderated by the presence of social signals. Originality The study revealed the differences between VA and VI in shaping consumers' responses, as well as the effect of social signals in VR environment, which provide a new perspective for future VR research in the context of interactive marketing.