IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING ON CONSUMER ONLINE PURCHASE INTENTION

Abstract

Technology and the boom ofthe internet have encouraged people to connect with each other, share information and build relationships and the social web has presented a new form of communication through social media which allow people to interact and converse with each other . This presents marketers with the opportunity to affect consumers purchase decisions through online marketing and social media. The main objectives of this study is to determine the impact of social media marketing on brand trust and online purchase intention, to determine ifsocial media marketing and EWOM helps customers in getting more information about the product or brand more than the traditional means (WOM), to determine the impact of brand trust on online purchase intention and to know the consumer’s assurance in purchasing products online. This design of the research is a causal research design. According to the research requirements, this study needed data to analyze the behavior of social media users. For this purpose of the study, social media platforms have been used. Data from 219 respondents were collected through an online questionnaire and the hypothesized causal relationships were tested using structure equation modeling (SEM). This study shows that the consumers do not trust on social EWOM as compare to the social media marketing. So, it would be recommended to focus more on those hypotheses which are accepted and seems more feasible and reliable for the consumers to create online purchase intention. This study has been limited to the apparel industry only and the data has been collected mostly from the people of urban areas as it has more literacy level, awareness, sense offashion, use oftechnological devices and income level as compare to rural areas. Whereas, there is low level ofusage ofsocial media devices in rural areas