Does social media marketing enhance impulse purchasing among female customers case study of Jordanian female shoppers

In a report about social media presented by the Arab Social Media Influencer Summit (2015) it was mentioned that 86% of young individuals between the ages of 25-35 are involved in almost every social media website there is. Jordan registered the highest usage within the Levant are of Facebook and WhatsApp with a high usage and involvement among young citizens. The current research study aims at examining the role that social media marketing played among individuals in Jordan; precisely females and how it increased their impulsive purchasing of items through a social media platform. Through the quantitative approach, and using the questionnaire as a tool, the researcher distributed the tool on total of (400) female individuals forming a convenient sample of the study. The results of the analysis indicated that social media marketing had an influence on impulsive purchasing behavior among shoppers noting to the variable of variety seeking which presented through the social media platforms. The research however recommends a deeper investigation of how the impulsive and instant purchasing behavior was influenced by social media and the social media touched the behavior of the customer into a different scheme. Corresponding author: Mohammad Fahmi Al-Zyoud Email addresses for corresponding author: dr.m.alzyoud@gmail.com First submission received: 14th February 2018 Revised submission received: 16th April 2018 Accepted: 3rd May 2018 Introduction In today’s marketing sphere the communication setting has been transformed by the social media. Social media has turned out to be an effective vehicle for conveying women's' rights issues to the consideration of a more extensive open, arousing activity in the city of urban areas around the globe and urging arrangement producers to venture up responsibilities regarding gender equality. It has been suggested that social media has considerably impacted marketing communication and created ties between consumers and marketers. This evolution has brought many novel opportunities and potentials within the trade and commerce and increased the accessibility of a variety of products and brands. This has impacted how consumers make purchasing decisions. Social networking marketing is one of these eminent and novel marketing innovations that has turned consumers from observers into participants. It has made it possible for consumers and brands to be connected without limitation of location, means of communication and time. It has facilitated two-way communication and changed the consumers’ attitude from submissive contributors into lively manipulators and originators. The online platform offers consumers convenience as well as a large portfolio of opportunities from which consumers can select and have access to full information. It also allows consumers to access online store without restrictions and compare products of vendors internationally. Traditional business is characterized by constrained product availability, constrained closing and opening times, as well as physical location constrains; this is not the case with online shops as they are available around the clock as long as a consumer has an Internet access. The online business also accrues benefits such as absence of delivery efforts, and less social pressure. As noted by Dawson and Kim (2009) consumers tend to prefer online shopping to offline shopping because online shopping is associated with convenience. According to Dawson and Kim (2009), this convenience motivates consumers to engage in impulse buying when making purchase decisions. This trend has Journal of Business and Retail Management Research (JBRMR), Vol. 13 Issue 2 December 2018 www.jbrmr.com A Journal of the Academy of Business and Retail Management (ABRM) 136 motivated researchers to give attention to online impulse buying (OIB) (Park, Kim, Funches, & Foxx, 2012). Some researchers (Akram, Hui, Khan, Saduzai, Akram, & Bhati, 2017; Yu, & Bastin, 2010) have indicated that impulse buying process is controlled by emotions and that hedonics motivation influence consumers to engage in OIB behaviors. In addition, studies have suggested that impulse buying, and hedonic motivation are positively related (Zhou, Dai, & Zhang, 2007; Hausman, 2000). It is argued that hedonic consumers tend to purchase impulsively. According to Akram et al., 2017), hedonic motivation strongly influences OIB. Within the Jordan context, few studies have recognized the influence of social media marketing to enhance impulse purchasing. However, recent studies have mirrored the capability of social media to conquer any hindrance that frequently isolates grassroots ladies' activism from approach making forms. The blast of online networking and uncommon use by ladies of new innovations speaks to essential chances to bring sexual orientation equality and women's rights issues to the bleeding edge of both strategies making and media consideration. With the course of time, women appeared to be more involved in the world of social media; they began using it in many different ways and approaches to express their feelings, clarify their stand points and use its tools to mingle and socialize with other people. After the appearance of the e-commerce and involving social media in the process of purchasing and marketing; consumer behavior changed and took a new perspective. Customers who were influenced by the appearance of social media marketing were also women whose purchasing behavior also took a new route reaching a state of full satisfaction and involvement in the social media purchasing (Loiseau and Nowacka, 2015). Problem Statement Currently, when we talk about social media, we talk about women empowerment, also, we may talk about changing women's behavior (Loiseau and Nowacka, 2015). The change in the behavior among individuals in general and women in spectacular stemmed from the fact that social media is a now a platform in which every individual has the right and the openness to perform any activity according to their mood and need. With the appearance of social media as a marketing tool the shopping and purchasing behavior of individuals changed and the idea of purchasing became more apparent and usable among them. According to Dennis, Morgan, Wright, and Jayawardhena (2010), it was found out that marketing through social media can influence young women's shopping behavior, while Hajly (2013) indicated that the purchasing behavior changed dramatically ever since the appearance of social media websites as a platform for marketing. On the other hand, Chaiprasit (2014) noted to the fact that with the year 2020, no people would be going out to malls and markets for shopping, they all would be doing their shopping on the Internet and precisely through social media websites; the researcher added that the ease of use in addition to the trust of social media websites are among the main drivers that would change the behavior of female consumers from browsing to real purchasing intentions. Also, Nasir, Vel, and Mateen (2012) noted to the huge change that social media have had on the behavior of customers focusing on the idea that the shopping intentions of female customers has become more vivid after the entrance of social media in the world of marketing. According to Al-Zu'bi and Almajali (2015), the obsession of shopping has become the focus of many sectors including the marketing and the psychiatrics sector in Jordan. The authors argued that women are normally more attracted to shopping sprees, and with the prevalence of the social media marketing, they have become more interested in buying items from the comfort of their own homes. In an article within a local Jordanian newspaper in 2010, it was revealed that 47% of Jordanian citizens buy at least one item/month online. The article added that the percentage of male online shoppers is almost the same as women as both have discovered the idea of buying items from their own chair without the need to move from a place to another. From that point, the researcher intention from this study is to examine the influence of social media marketing on the impulsive purchasing behavior among female consumers in Jordan. The idea of shopping through social media platforms has changed the basics of social media into a marketing media in order to attract more customers through the usage of many of social media characteristics like uploading videos, pictures not to mention the role of the word of mouth in increasing the impulse towards buying more items. Journal of Business and Retail Management Research (JBRMR), Vol. 13 Issue 2 December 2018 www.jbrmr.com A Journal of the Academy of Business and Retail Management (ABRM) 137 Questions, Objectives and Hypotheses Research Questions Based on the problem statement, the current research seeks to answer the following questions: R1What is the impact of social media marketing on impulse buying among female shoppers in Jordan? R2What are the characteristics of online shopping that influence females to shop online and through social media websites? R3How can the dimensions of impulse purchasing interact with social media marketing? Study Objectives This study was guided by three key objectives: To explore impulse buying behaviors among Jordanian female online shoppers and how it is influenced by social media marketing To examine the characteristics of online shopping and how they influence females to shop online through social media websites To examine the relationship between dimensions of impulse purchasing and social media marketing Main Hypothesis H: Social media marketing has a positive influence on impulse buying among female shoppers in Jordan Sub-Hypotheses Ha: Social media marketing has a positive influence on hedonic motivation among female shoppers in Jordan Hb: Social media marketing has a positive influence on website quality among female shoppers in Jordan Hc: Social media marketing has a positive influence on trust am