Platform-Generated Cues in Live-Streaming Commerce: An Empirical Study from an Emerging Market

This research investigates the impact of non-human factors in social commerce, including functionalities of live-streaming, customer response speed, promotional tools, follower count and reviews on consumers’ online shopping behavior. Based on the Signaling Theory and Cue Utilization Theory, the article discusses how external cues become signals for credibility and popularity compensating for the absence of human interaction. An online questionnaire was posted on different active social commerce forums in Dhaka, Bangladesh, and data collection was conducted with 157 respondents, which were subsequently analyzed with SmartPLS. The results show that promotional tools and follower have significant effects on purchase behavior and live streaming has an indirect effect on purchase behavior through the number of follower count. On the flip side, response time as well as online reviews had no significant effect. Social proof and promotional stimuli outweigh cognitive or functional cues, according to the findings. This research contributes to literature on digital persuasion, providing implications for managers for reinforcing consumer trust via real digital signals and promotion variants based on algorithms.