Investigating social commerce as an alternate model for online commerce in developing countries : a case of Pakistani economy

The study is an empirical quantitative research. In light of intense literature review it proposes a new model for effectiveness of social commerce in Pakistan. It has three objectives. It firstly investigates the relationship between perceived risk, social networking focus, and perceived value effect trust. It secondly investigates the relationship between affective influence, word of mouth, affective influence, advertising influence, purchasing experience and viral reach on social commerce. Lastly it investigates how consumer value (adoption and purchase intention is affected by social commerce focus and trust. The software used is SPSS 15.0. Multiple regression equation has been employed to verify the hypotheses. Results show and validate the literature that positive or favorable views of users trigger positive attitude. However, there are two variables and dimensions that do not affect the attitude of users on social networks from the perspective of shopping i.e. social commerce; these are viral reach and previous purchasing experience on different websites. The results show that Pakistani users will welcome social commerce even if they have no previous experience for purchasing goods and services online