{"title":"Can Virtual Influencers Replace Human Influencers in Live-Streaming E-Commerce? An Exploratory Study from Practitioners’ and Consumers’ Perspectives","authors":"Anan Wan, M. Jiang","doi":"10.1080/10641734.2023.2224416","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract We conducted expert interviews and a consumer experiment to investigate practitioners’ and consumers’ attitudes toward and adoption of virtual influencers to substitute human influencers in live-streaming e-commerce (LSC). Results of consumer data confirmed practitioner insights that virtual (versus human) influencers generated less positive attitudes and lower levels of perceived warmth, trust, usefulness, and dialogue. Contrary to practitioner insights, consumers did not perceive virtual influencers as more enjoyable, easier to use, more distant, and more likely to generate purchase intention than human influencers. Furthermore, influencer warmth (usefulness) is positively related to influencer attitude (purchase intention). Implications and limitations are discussed.","PeriodicalId":43045,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Current Issues and Research In Advertising","volume":"44 1","pages":"332 - 372"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2000,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"2","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Current Issues and Research In Advertising","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/10641734.2023.2224416","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"BUSINESS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 2
Abstract
Abstract We conducted expert interviews and a consumer experiment to investigate practitioners’ and consumers’ attitudes toward and adoption of virtual influencers to substitute human influencers in live-streaming e-commerce (LSC). Results of consumer data confirmed practitioner insights that virtual (versus human) influencers generated less positive attitudes and lower levels of perceived warmth, trust, usefulness, and dialogue. Contrary to practitioner insights, consumers did not perceive virtual influencers as more enjoyable, easier to use, more distant, and more likely to generate purchase intention than human influencers. Furthermore, influencer warmth (usefulness) is positively related to influencer attitude (purchase intention). Implications and limitations are discussed.