Volume/Issue/Review Month: Volume-XVII, Issue-II, Jul.-Dec.
Title: Social Buying and Social Selling: Holistic Perspective on Indian B2B Buyers and Sellers
Authors: Balaji Abraham, Chinmoy Kumar Roy , Diksha Bedekar, Gaurav Das
Broad area: Marketing
Abstract:
This study aims to provide a comprehensive view of social media usage for its usefulness and ease-of-use in Business-to-Business (B2B) context, encompassing buying and selling centers in India. The study involved quantitative research with data collected through an online survey-based questionnaire from the chosen practitioners across buying and selling centers. The data was collected from 448 practitioners in India across buying (203) and selling centers (245). The data was analyzed using a structural equations modeling approach to test the hypotheses. Descriptive analysis of the categorical variables was done. The analysis of data revealed a holistic view of social media usage in the B2B context by identifying the social media usage drivers in buying and selling centers. The ease of use of social media positively influences its usefulness and the usage among B2B practitioners. Further, the usefulness of social media positively influences the usage. Furthermore, the responses were significantly different between the buying and selling centers. However, the difference among categorical variables such as gender, age, role level and industry type did not elicit significant difference. The results offer buying and selling practitioners in India with a view on how to craft their social media strategy. This study extends existing literature in B2B social media in the India context by providing a holistic view of social media usage among buying and selling centers.