The Sequence Effect of Supplementary Online Comments in Book Sales

Abstract

This paper explores how the sequence of positive or negative comments and the degree of product involvement affect the purchase intention of consumers through a <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$2\times 2$ </tex-math></inline-formula> experiment. The results demonstrated that the sequence of positive or negative supplementary comments will affect the consumer’s purchase intention, while the degree of product involvement will adjust the relationship between them. Specifically, the conclusions include three points: (1) compared to initial comments, supplementary comments have a greater impact on a consumer’s purchase intention; (2) when the initial comments are positive but the supplementary ones are negative, consumers who have a high degree of product involvement would have a greater purchase intention than those who demonstrate a low degree of product involvement; (3) In the case of negative initial comments / positive supplementary comments, consumers with low product involvement are more likely to purchase than consumers who have a high product involvement.