Antecedents of Online Reviews' Usage and Purchase Influence: An Empirical Comparison of US and Korean Consumers

We propose a model linking consumer characteristics (consumer susceptibility to interpersonal influence and Internet shopping experience), attitude toward online reviews (perceived usefulness), and the outcome of online reviews (usage frequency and purchase influence). We advance hypotheses on the interrelationships among these factors and on the moderating effects of national culture on some of the relationships. We test the hypotheses on survey data collected from U.S. and Korean consumers. The results show that national culture has important moderating effects on the relationships among online reviews and its antecedents. The results suggest that an attitude-oriented marketing communication strategy is more effective for Korean consumers while a behavior-oriented strategy is more effective for U.S. consumers. (C) 2009 Direct Marketing Educational Foundation, Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.