Why Amazon Uses Both the New York Times Best Seller List and Customer Reviews: An Empirical Study of Effects of Traditional and Social Earned Media on Product Sales

摘要

In the new media landscape, consumers acquire product information from journalists through traditional media (traditional earned media), and from fellow consumers through social media (social earned media). Consumers consider earned media more independent and reliable than company advertising (paid media). Media industry practitioners argue that traditional and social earned media are likely to be complementary rather than replacement sources to each other (Barthelemy et al. 2011). For example, when the ING group asks which media consumers will turn to for financial information—traditional media like Barron's, The Wall Street Journal, and Bloomberg, or social media like Twitter and Facebook, 55% consumers report reading news from traditional media whereas 33% from social media (TNG 2012). However, given the evidences that consumers are using both media, the understanding of the joint effects of traditional and social media on product sales only emerges recently (Trusov et al. 2009, Stephen and Galak 2012). This article helps fill this gap by investigating three research questions: (1) What are the effects of traditional and social media on product sales when they are both available to consumers? (2) What is the effect of product sales on social media? (3) Are there any interactions between traditional and social media?