How do influencers’ impression management tactics affect purchase intention in live commerce? – Trust transfer and gender differences

Abstract

Influencers in live commerce play a pivotal role in guiding consumers’ purchase decisions. Prior studies have explored how influencers’ different characteristics impact consumers’ purchase intention in live commerce. Nevertheless, the role of influencers’ impression management strategies in this context remains a largely unexplored terrain. We draw on the impression management lens and integrate the stimulus-organism-response framework together with social role theory to examine a comprehensive research model regarding how influencers’ different impression management tactics (i.e., self-focused, consumer-focused, and product-focused impression management tactics) affect trust perceptions, which further contribute to female and male consumers’ purchase intention in live commerce. We first conducted a qualitative interview (N = 71) to validate the existence of influencers’ three impression management tactics, and then designed a scenario-based survey (N = 241) to test the research model. Our study enriches the understanding of impression management tactics in the live commerce context, extends social role theory to explain the different decision pathways of female and male consumers during live shopping, and also offers practical insights for influencers and managers of live commerce platforms.