Explaining Customers’ Utilitarian and Hedonic Perceptions in the Context of Product Search within Social Network-Enabled Shopping Websites

Online social networks and e-Commerce have recently begun to converge into hybrid configurations via which online users search for products in the context of their social relationships. The present study explains how shoppers’ differences in two aspects of their social capital (centrality: their number of online friends, and quality: the relevance of these friends) influence the extent to which their product search experiences are perceived to be useful and enjoyable. For that matter, three value-creation paths (social network activation, effort reduction, and curiosity arousal) are proposed as the main explanatory mechanisms. Providing insights into this process is important as it will help develop a clearer understanding of the mechanisms via which digital networks influence customers’ product search experiences.