Employee or influencer live streaming? A manufacturer’s strategy for virtual character adoption considering live streaming reviews

Live streaming operations are getting popular nowadays. Considering that a manufacturer sells its products to consumers via a live streaming channel, we investigate the manufacturer’s strategies for virtual character adoption, as well as live-streamer (i.e., employee or influencer) selection, considering live streaming reviews. Some important factors are identified to assess live streaming: (i) manufacturer’s quality improvement and live streaming reviews influencing consumers’ quality perception; (ii) influencer power and value, which reflect the influencer’s personal influence and content categories, respectively; and (iii) virtual character’s main characteristics, namely the virtual character’s intelligence level and product exposure power. We analyze five live streaming scenarios: merchant live streaming channel without virtual character (Scenario EN), merchant live streaming channel with virtual character (Scenario EV), influencer live streaming channel without virtual character (Scenario IN), influencer live streaming channel with virtual character (Scenario IV), and virtual character live streaming channel (Scenario V). Our findings show that for live-streamer selection, regardless of whether a virtual character is introduced, the manufacturer should select the employee (influencer) at the low (high) influencer power. However, without (with) virtual character, it should select the employee (influencer) at the moderate influencer power. Besides, under the high virtual character’s intelligence level (and its low cost factor), the influencer (manufacturer) should adopt the virtual character as the assistant of live-streamer. Moreover, whether to adopt Scenario V depends on the virtual character’s product exposure power and intelligence level in Scenarios EN, EV, and V, as well as its product exposure power, intelligence level, and influencer power in Scenarios IN, IV, and V. Finally, we consider the slice live streaming scenarios to encompass more scenarios.