The Effects Of Streamer’s Sales Style On Customer Engagement In Livestream Ecommerce

Livestream ecommerce has emerged as a new sales channel and has provided firms with new growth opportunities.With social interaction and online sales attributes,it offers customers a realistic viewing experience and opportunities to interact with streamers.Consequently,firms can increase brand awareness and stimulate customers’ desire to buy.Streamers,as salesperson play a vital role in livestream ecommerce,and the sales style of streamers has become a significant factor influencing customer engagement.Streamers are mainly divided into celebrity streamers and paid streamers.How to choose the right streamers is a problem that most firms are facing at present.The existing research has established that the characteristics and behaviors of streamers can influence customers’purchasing decisions,there is still a gap in relevant research to investigate the influence mechanism of the sales style of streamers on customer engagement.Therefore,this study aims to explore the impact of the sales style of streamers(sales-oriented and customer-oriented)on customer engagement,analyze the intermediary role of sales mechanism(scarcity)and relationship interaction mechanism(identity)in the influence of the sales style of streamers on customer participation,and investigate the difference effect of streamer type on the above paths.Through secondary data analysis and 2(streamer sales style:customer-oriented vs.sales-oriented)× 2(product reputation:high vs.low)intergroup experiments,we systematically tested the research hypothesis.The results show that the streamer’s customer orientation positively affects the customer engagement through the relationship interaction mechanism(customer-streamer identity),and the streamer’s sales orientation can positively affect the customer engagement through the sales mechanism(perceived scarcity).In different streamer types,the influence mechanism of streamer sales orientation on customer engagement is different.In celebrity streamer scenarios,streamers" sales orientation enhances customer engagement by positively moderating the effect of brand reputation on perceived scarcity.In paid streamer scenarios,streamer sales orientation positively affects customer engagement through perceived scarcity.This study expands the relevant research in the field of livestream ecommerce,and analyzes the influence mechanism of promoting customer participation in livestream ecommerce from the perspectives of identity and scarcity.This study enrichs the articles on the field of sales,and explores the mechanism of the streamer as a salesperson to play a sales role in the livestream ecommerce.This study provides some management suggestions for firms to choose streamers,and also has certain guiding significance for streamers to adapt appropriate sales styles according to different products and improve their business capabilities.