A study on the determinants of online review helpfulness and moderation effect of digital sampling experience

Abstract

With the full-fledged operations of many online stores and the conspicuous increase of the number of users who are well versed in the online culture of exchanging personal opinions through SNS, the accessibility to diverse product reviews has been heightened online. Product reviews exert major effects on purchasing decisions by affording potential users to have indirect experience before making a buying commitment. Thus, it is critical for product manufactures or online sellers to be able to distinguish helpful reviews. Also, it is necessary to un-derstand how to write more helpful reviews from the perspective of reviewers. To identify those factors that have significant effects on the helpfulness of online reviews, the present study has examined key characteristics of 8000 reviews written for the products offered by Amazon, building upon the recent theories and empirical findings accumulated across multiple disciplines (MIS, CS and IR). Fur-ther, this study has examined the moderation effect of whether the product is subject to digital sampling experi-ence, providing a new perspective on understanding the relative characteristics of reviews written for meaning-fully different product categories. Those factors that have been identified by this research as determinants of the helpfulness of online reviews are suggested as essential considerations for establishing effective review utilization and exposure strategies. Also, the study findings are expected to contribute to writing helpful reviews as well as identifying important reviews early when sufficient reactions from the users are not yet secured.