Syntax Literate: Jurnal Ilmiah Indonesia pï¿½ISSN: 2541-0849

e-ISSN: 2548-1398

Vol. 7, No. 4, April 2022

HOW WOM AND EWOM ACTS AS A DRIVER TO A CUSTOMERï¿½S PURCHASE DECISION. A LITERATURE REVIEW

Joshua Hezekiah Kairupan, Irmawan Rahyadi

Faculty of Communication, Binus University, Indonesia

Email: [email protected], [email protected]

Abstract

This study aimed at examining the factors that cause the disparity of punishment in cases of sexual intercourse and molestation of minors, especially in Salatiga City, the impact of the occurrence of criminal disparities, and how the policy model for criminal acts of sexual intercourse and obscenity should be seen from the decidendi theory. The results of the study showed that the disparity in criminal penalties in criminal cases with children as victims is the existence of internal and external factors. Internal factors is in the form of a judge's own personality. While external factor is the legal factor or the legislation itself and the situation factor in the person who is in the perpetrator or defendant. The judge must be careful in seeing, digging, and observing the facts in the trial. Judges must pay attention to the attitude of prudence, avoiding carelessness, both formal and material to technical skills. The judge needs to give reasons or considerations following the values of truth and justice (ratio decidendi). The judge must also use common sense or rational thinking by paying attention to the previous judge's decisions to avoid striking disparity in sentencing. Currently, the judiciary in Indonesia, especially in the Salatiga District Court, still uses the method of imposing sentences based on trial examinations only. This causes court decisions issued by judges to have differences between one decision and another, which is called criminal disparity. The research method used by the researcher was a juridical-normative research method equipped with an in-depth case approach using the ratio decidendi theory. The technique of collecting legal materials used was a literature study. The legal material analysis technique used was deductive data analysis.

Keywords:ï¿½ WOM; eWOM; Word of Mouth; Electronic Word of Mouth; WOM Valence; eWOM Valence; Purchase Decision; Online Reviews

Introduction

In marketing, word of mouth (WOM) is the act of consumers providing information about goods, services, brands, or companies to other consumers (Babić Rosario, Sotgiu, De Valck, & Bijmolt, 2016). Word of mouth (WoM) communication, a powerful force in the market place, is revisited by corporates as the new means of marketing communication for improving customer satisfaction and loyalty (Srivastava & Sharma, 2017). Consumers often go online to share their opinions about products with other consumers. The extent that consumers engage in electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is known to be affected by personal motivations, such as the need to belong, the desire to help others and self-enhancement (Pezzuti & Leonhardt, 2021). Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) may influence perceptions of prices, particularly in a service market. WOM research has a long history and the empirical analyses show that positive (negative) WOM has a positive (negative) impact on the shift in the receiverï¿½s brand-purchase probability. The results also show that positive WOM (eWOM) has a stronger impact on brand purchase probability than negative WOM (eWOM) (Liang & Corkindale, 2019). E commerce platforms has also influenced and has created a high impact on consumer behavior, varying from information acquisition to post-purchase behavior such as dissatisfaction statements or behaviors in the form of feedback and review (Jha, 2019). These interpersonal exchanges provide access to information related to the consumption of that product or service over and above formal advertising, i.e., that goes beyond the messages provided by the companies and involuntarily influences the individualï¿½s decision-making. Consequently, WOM is considered the most important information source in consumersï¿½ buying decisions (Huete-Alcocer 2017) Understandably, companies view both types of recommendations ï¿½ WOM and eWOM ï¿½ as a new opportunity to listen to customersï¿½ needs and adjust how they promote their products or services to better meet them, thereby increasing their return. A negative or positive attitude toward the product or service will influence customersï¿½ future purchase intentions by allowing them to compare the product or serviceï¿½s actual performance with their expectations (Yang, 2017).

Research Methodology

The purpose of studying previous literature on WOM is owing to two reasons. One, though there is ample study on the WOM and eWOM, few studies consolidate these researches into a comprehensive review of literature. Two, this study makes an attempt to provide future researches direction and purpose by highlighting the gaps as well as providing a model for studying the causeï¿½effect relationship and how big of an impact WOM and eWOM is towards purchase decision. Stages of research involved searching for relevant research papers in online data base sources such as sage journals and wiley. Following key words/phrases used in the search, word of mouth, e-word of mouth, word of mouth on purchase decision,Manual search of leading journals was also conducted to ensure no major work has been excluded out of this study.

Inclusion and exclusion criteria

The search was limited to articles in English published during the period 2010-2021 to ensure accuracy and validity of theories used. Included were only qualitative and quantitative studies (not limited to designs) focused on any form of purchase intention nor decision that is influenced or based of Word Of Mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word Of Mouth (eWOM) as one of the essential main factor that drives customers or consumers into a purchase decision.

Retrieval of studies and methodological characteristics

A total of 138 papers were retrieved. Overall, 75 studies were identified and removed due to not being able to support this study; 63 studies were examined against excluded/inclusive criteria by author independently. Based on this, 43 articles were removed. Only 20 studies met the inclusion criteria. These 20 papers were examined by the author independently to evaluate relevance, studies collected came from the America, India, Hong Kong, Australia and Nigeria. Within these 20 Papers they had a diversity of different businesses. Such as Hotels, Restaurants, E-commerce sites, Online and Offline Retail stores, Facebook market place and also various marketplace sites such as Ebay according to their countries and regions.

Data extraction

Data from the papers included in the review were extracted by author. The data was pooled within the application Microsoft Excel. The 20 papers used within this study were listed into Microsoft Excel, the methods and results were also listed and examined closely to determine whether or not Word of Mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word of Mouth (E-WOM) had a big impact on purchase decisions. Also whether both not Word of Mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word of Mouth (E-WOM) were able to act as a driver to make a consumer come to a purchase decision.

Results and Discussion

All 20 papers came to a conclusion that WOM or eWOM had a big or positive effect on any kind of sales. Whether it be in the food industry, e-commerce, retail or any kind of business. When previous customers or online bloggers state a positive review based on experience, it would boost the amount of trust of future or current customers who are considering to purchase something from a certain store that they have been interested in or have been paying close attention to. However in the opposite side, when there has been an engagement of negative WOM or eWOM, the amount of people interested in purchasing something from that store would immediately reconsider or even find somewhere else to purchase the same item that they intended to. With the purpose of feeling safe throughout the whole transaction process.

WOM as a part of the Marketing Mix, Business Communication and Advertising

A fundamental development in the marketing landscape of the past two decades is the realization that word of mouth (WOM) should be viewed as part of the marketing mix and managed accordingly (Dost, Phieler, Haenlein, & Libai, 2019). The four Ps of marketing are the key factors that are involved in the marketing of a good or service. They are the product, price, place, and promotion of a good or service. Often referred to as the marketing mix, the four Ps are constrained by internal and external factors in the overall business environment, and they interact significantly with one another. The 4 Ps are used by companies to identify some key factors for their business, including what consumers want from them, how their product or service meets or fails to meet those needs, how their product or service is perceived in the world, how they stand out from their competitors, and how they interact with their customers. Word-of-mouth marketing differs from natural word-of-mouth references to a company's products and services in how it may come as the result of a promotion, encouragement, or other influence by a company, otherwise known as "seeding." When a diner has a wonderful time at a restaurant because their expectations were exceeded and later tells tweets about it, or when someone had a great experience using a product in a new way and tells everyone they know about it, those are examples of word-of-mouth marketing. Also, word-of-mouth marketing does not stop at the first interaction; it tends to lead to a cascade of follow-on interactions. The encouragement on the part of a company may take one of several forms. The best way is to give them a reason to talk, such as exceeding expectations or providing insider skills or information about a product. Other strategies include offering consumers new ways to share information about a company's products and services, and engaging and interacting with the consumer, such as through exemplary customer service. (Investopedia 2021). WOM is considered the most important information source in consumersï¿½ buying decisions and intended behavior. For example, tourist satisfaction is of utmost importance because of its influence on behavioral intentions, WOM and purchasing decisions. In other words, overall satisfaction leads to the possibility of revisiting and recommending the destination (Huete-Alcocer, 2017). Due to the power of WOM and eWOM, itï¿½s understandable that businesses would aim to include them in a marketing strategy. However, this has also led to dishonest attempts at WOM campaigns. Therefore, the Word of Mouth Marketing.

Association (WOMMA) has laid out some guidelines: Word of mouth marketing should be: honest, social, able to be repeated, respectful and provide measurable results. It should be forthcoming about the businessï¿½ identity, the opinions held as well as what/who is being represented. In other words, although WOMM ultimately aims to create a viral effect to reach and convert customers, this should not be done in any way that is misleading.

eWOM

eWOM has been considered as a major tool for exchanging information with diverse audiences both online and offline at the same time (Mahmud, Islam, Ali, & Mehjabin, 2020). With the spread of social media, a new form of WOM called electronic word of mouth (eWOM) has emerged. Nowadays, many companies in different industries are actively using social media as an essential tool for reaching their potential and existing customers (Zainal et al., 2017). eWOM represents one of the most significant developments in contemporary consumer behavior. With more than three billion consumers and seven billion devices are connected to the Internet, eWOM has become ubiquitous and accessible, turning consumers into ï¿½web-fortifiedï¿½ decision makers (Babić Rosario et al., 2016). The eWOM valence shows the nature of online review in the form of positive or negative or mixed-neutral remarks/experience given by customer in the form of a rating. The eWOM volume indicates the number of online reviews posted per product/service, The eWOM content is the message in the form of text, image or video. The relative importance of the types of eWOM changes with various factors, such as type of products, social ties and consumption goals (Roy, Datta, & Basu, 2017). Because of its flexibility, the multidimensional nature of online users and eWOMï¿½s relatively lower costs, marketers are continuously working on developing and applying sustainable eWOM strategies to maximize value for their business (Mahmud et al., 2020). Therefore, with the increase in peopleï¿½s online behavior, e-WOM has become the main factor affecting customer decision-making (Bu, Parkinson, & Thaichon, 2021). Having defined its key components, we further propose that eWOM consists of three key stages: creation, exposure and evaluation. For eWOM to have an effect in the marketplace, it first needs to be created. Then, consumers need to be exposed to it, because eWOM that is created but not noticed will not have any effect. Finally, for the effect to materialize, consumers need to evaluate the eWOM message and take it into account in their decision-making process. Throughout these three stages consumers take on a dual role: They are eWOM creators, senders of information, and when they are exposed or evaluating, they are eWOM receivers. In our literature review, we focused on what we know about consumersï¿½ motivations, opportunities, and abilities to create, be exposed to, and evaluate eWOM. We also described what marketers can do in each of the three eWOM stages to influence consumer motivations, increase their opportunities, and reinforce their abilities as senders and receivers of eWOM. The social web has empowered consumers to generate content that reaches a large audience. This generated content is alluded to as Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM). Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is usually generated by both consumers and marketers and these contents are referred to as user generated content and marketer generated content respectively. Marketers disseminate information through organization-controlled websites whereas consumers share their product experience through SNSs (Social Network Sites). This information exchange is referred to as word of mouth (WOM). WOM is the opinion of other consumers resulting from their experience using certain products and services. The interaction between consumers could happen physically or virtually and given its potential in marketing it is believed to be the next big thing to easily influence consumers (Ali, Hussin, & Dahlan, 2020). By nature Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) takes from as a written type of communication, in this manner Electronic Word Of Mouth (eWOM) is to be written and spread easily, not to mention the presence of the internet has taken it up to a whole new level, whether it be on social media, E-Commerce sites, review sites basically the Internet has powered the growth and spread of Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM). Although it might seem that Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) has an edge or leverage against its more traditional counterpart Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is an asynchronous process is a process that the Workflow Engine cannot complete immediately because it contains activities that interrupt the flow. Examples of activities that force an asynchronous process include deferred activities, notifications with responses, blocking activities, and wait activities. Meaning there is a lot of noise and in between processes that could interrupt the flow of information before it reaches the end target or receiver. Although Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is an asynchronous process it has some certain perks such as, a very vast and fast diffusion process. It will spread in a very short amount of time as long as done in a correct way and accordingly to the algorithm of the internet. This also means that the range of its spread is wide and unlimited, when a post shared to a group or a friend, that post will be shared again over and over and will eventually cover all the possible targeted receivers of the information. The reviews and feedback or any type of Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is mostly anonymous this means that the information we gain via Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is unbiased, however within all types of Word of Mouth, whether it be traditional Word of Mouth (WOM) or Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) the credibility of the information is to be questioned and further researched even from the most trustworthy sites or sources. Lastly the one of the most helpful things of Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is that it is observable which enables quantitative studies and processed data.

WOM

WOM communication is defined as ï¿½informal communications, directed at other consumers, about ownership, usage, or characteristics about particular goods and services and/or their producers/sellers (Srivastava & Sharma, 2017). WOM (receivers, senders, sellers, platforms, and other consumers) each have their own interests, which are often in conflict. Thus, receivers of WOM are faced with a judgment task in deciding what information to rely on: They must make inferences about the product in question and about the players who pro‐ vide or present WOM. To do so, they use signals embedded in various components of WOM, such as average star ratings, message content, or sender characteristics. The product and player information provided by these signals shapes the impact of WOM by allowing receivers to make inferences about (a) their likelihood of product satisfaction, and (b) the trustworthiness of WOM players, and therefore the trust‐ worthiness of their content (Moore & Lafreniere, 2020). The influence of word-of-mouth has been studied extensively in consumer decision making. This body of work is characterized by a number of assumptions: (1) that word-of mouth is a homogenous activity; (2) that electronic word-of mouth is more influential than traditional word-of-mouth; and (3) that word-of-mouth is predominantly verbal, not visual (Ring, Tkaczynski, & Dolnicar, 2016). Word of mouth in marketing is the unpaid spread of information from one person to another through conversation, specifically advising on a particular business or product. Word of mouth is used to describe the result of a marketing strategy that causes customers and a businessï¿½ target audience to discuss the product or service in everyday conversation. Word of mouth can occur as the result of a positive experience, an innovative new product or high-quality customer service, for example. The aim of word of mouth marketing is to create a product or experience that will result in customers sharing the details with their friends, family or colleagues. Lately, businesses have been looking for new ways to optimize this free source of promotion and lead generation. WOM has a greater impact than other means of communication and is seen as a powerful force in the market place (Srivastava & Sharma, 2017). Word of mouth has an important impact on consumer behavior (Babić Rosario et al., 2016). Word of Mouth (WOM) as mentioned above is mostly interpreted as an oral or face to face communication which is done usually among inner circles such as friends, colleagues, peers and relatives. Word Of Mouth (WOM) is also a synchronous process meaning, it is a process that can be executed without interruption from start to finish. Since Word of Mouth (WOM) is an interpersonal type of communication it can be processed and shared without interruption from start to finish. Example, an individual will be sharing their experience with a certain service or product regardless good or bad to their friends, colleagues, peers and relatives in a conversation as an opening statement and will be kept as a topic of the conversation until the individual is done talking about it which make a perfect synchronous process. However within Word Of Mouth there are some disadvantages such as, Limited Diffusion. Just because an individual has brought up their experience on a product or service within their inner circle it doesnï¿½t mean that the receivers of that information will further spread that information unless brought to light within another conversation. Secondly Word of Mouth (WOM) is non anonymous which means the information shared is from a known associate or from an individualï¿½s inner circle which leads to a biased opinion which can also caused to a shared perspective based on the information gained by the receiver. And lastly traditional Word of Mouth (WOM) is non observable, it cannot be tracked or monitored of its growth and spread which leads to an uncertain quantitative data if to be observed and studied.

Purchase Decision

Consumer behavior with a special attention to purchase decision making has been of major interest to marketers for many years, as many approaches and models for the decision-making process have been used in studies they evolved into the typologies of decision-making models that are linked with the theories grounding the model types Among the theories that explain purchase decisionï¿½ making processes, the information-processing theory takes almost the central place (Dikcius, Urbonavicius, Pakalniskiene, & Pikturniene, 2020). Research interestingly indicates that price fairness may not always drive eWOM intentions and affect purchase decision when people add unique value to products and services (Jeong & Jang, 2011). Satisfaction is a process by which customers psychologically evaluate the performance of a product or service (Leung, 2020). In many cases rather than price reduction, promotional packages (like three users software license for 3 years at reasonable price) enhance customer purchase intension and lead to more sales. In Asian countries, when people purchase some products (such as medical cosmetics and antivirus software) to fulfil special needs or to prevent some unwanted causes, they spend more time on online reviews to know about the products Hence, eWOM (positive, negative and mixed-neutral) affects people with different consumption goals for online purchase decision (Roy et al., 2017). This applies as well for WOM as it can also affect online sales or offline sales (Purchase Decision). Trust is something that a person perceives personally, and it determines the nature of interaction and kind of information they will reveal to others; it has been considered as one of the major influential factors in making a purchasing decision (Alhidari & Almeshal, 2017). Purchase Decisions are actually a fruit of the many models based on the consumer behavior, these models present the purchase decisionï¿½making process as a logical flow of activities that sequentially flow from the problem.

Recognition to purchase and to the post-purchase evaluation stage. Typically, in the case of rational decision making, the purchase decisionï¿½making process is described as a sequence of five main stages: (a) problem recognition, (b) information search, (c) alternative evaluation and selection, (d) purchase decision, and (e) post-purchase evaluation (Dikcius et al., 2020).

Almost every individual in this world is exposed to one or more channels of mass media such as television, radio, newspaper, and outdoors. There are many aspects that advertisement can affect consumer-buying behavior and these aspects normally focus on cognition influences and emotional appeals. Understanding the products utility in consumersï¿½ perception and the process of conception are the key for marketers in understanding consumer purchase decision process. The consumers purchase action is a forward moving process. It starts before the actual purchase, and last after the purchase is made (Mustafa & Al-Abdallah, 2020). From here we can see that a consumer or customers purchase decision is bound to be affected by various things in which we can also see that Word of mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) plays a part in as well. If there were to be mostly positive reviews or positive discussions about a certain product from various circles (such as family & friends) a customer or consumer wonï¿½t have second thoughts about getting into a Purchase Decision. While on the other hand if the store or product were to have mostly negative reviews then the consumer or customer will hesitate to come to a purchase decision. A notable change during the past two decades is the growing realization that WOM not only is an organic part of customer interactions but can also be amplified through WOM programs. highlight three types of such WOM programs: referral programs, which encourage and incentivize current customers to contribute to customer acquisition by helping to acquire new customers; online recommendation programs, which encourage individuals to spread the word to their close social network or a broader network such as in an online review website; and seeding programs, which aim to get products into the hands of some individuals (seeds) in the hope that the consequent social influence will help accelerate and expand the growth process. Seeding programs are our focus here, specifically SMCs in the FMCG industry. To establish the context, we next describe the main insights from qualitative interviews regarding major European providersï¿½ planning and setup of SMCs (Dost et al., 2019). Consumers evaluate their decision and if the product succeeds in meeting the expectations the consumers will be satisfied, if the product exceeds their expectations the consumers are delighted. But if the product failed to meet the expectations, consumers would be dissatisfied and disappointed. Consumerï¿½s dissatisfaction increases when the gap between performance and expectation is large (Mustafa & Al-Abdallah, 2020).

WOM on Purchase Decision

The definition of WoM is information and/or rumor sharing between individuals. Literature has highlighted the fact that the influence of conversations between people is higher than the influence of traditional media or advertising (Katz & Lazarsfeld, 1955; Ryan & Gross, 1943) With the birth of the Internet, WoM is now disseminated without geographical and physical limits (Haikel-Elsabeh, Zhao, Ivens, & Brem, 2019). Word of mouth is one of the oldest ways of conveying information and it has been defined in many ways. One of the earliest definitions was that put forward by Katz and Lazarsfeld (1966), who described it as the exchanging of marketing information between consumers in such a way that it plays a fundamental role in shaping their behavior and in changing attitudes toward products and services.ï¿½ WOM is a person-to-person communication tool, between a communicator and a receiver, who perceives the information received about a brand, product, or service as non-commercial. Likewise, WOM has been defined as communication between consumers about a product, service, or company in which the sources are considered independent of commercial influence (Huete-Alcocer, 2017). Two important outcomes of consumer WOM are stimulating consumer purchase and motivating the retransmission of WOM (Baker, Donthu, & Kumar, 2016).ï¿½ Valences has also been proven to be a drive within WoM to whether a customer should end up purchasing that certain product or service. Within this Review it has been proven over the vast majority of Retail, Restaurants, Hotels all over the world end up being rented, hired or bought just by listening/reading to another customers previous experience with that product/service. Reading WoM helps consumers save time and risk thus decreasing search time (Sharma & Srivastava, 2017). The valence of WOM is the conversationï¿½s attractiveness (positivity) and averseness (negativity) of the information about a particular brand. Content with strong valence typically stimulates more consumer arousal and interest than neutral content (Berger and Milkman 2012). For instance made a purchase on an item from a retail store that I heard has the best quality in town, I came up with the decision to make that purchase because of the WoM from a close relative or friend. That came to happen because, these interpersonal exchanges provide access to information related to the consumption of that product or service over and above formal advertising, i.e., that goes beyond the messages provided by the companies and involuntarily influences the individualï¿½s decision-making (Huete-Alcocer, 2017). WOM is widely regarded as one of the most influential factors affecting consumer behavior and decision (Leung, 2020). Research has established that positive word-of-mouth (PWOM) typically motivates brand purchase or other positive brand outcomes (e.g., referrals) while negative word-of-mouth (NWOM) generally reduces purchase intentions and inhibits other brand behaviors (Baker et al., 2016). However, with the advance of technology, Cialdini (2009) proposed that WOM be broadly defined as social influences on consumer choices. These social influences include remote or digitalï¿½ as opposed to in-person or face-to-faceï¿½communication, such as Facebook comment (Leung, 2020).

eWOM on purchase Decision

Todayï¿½s new form of online WOM communication is known as electronic word-of-mouth or eWOM (Yang, 2017). Since the mobile Internet began to replace fixed Internet access, the tools used and the ways consumers search for information have become increasingly mobile (Bu et al., 2021). This form of communication has taken on special importance with the emergence of online platforms, which have made it one of the most influential information sources on the Web (Abubakar and Ilkan, 2016). eWOM also has made it possible for marketing to also evolve and take form as DCM, DCM is a new marketing concept; it is the most rapidly growing content marketing strategy in recent years; nevertheless, research on DCM has mainly looked at customer durables, packaged goods, and services (Bu et al., 2021 providing information about goods, services, brands, or companies to other consumers. Such information communicated through the Internet (e.g., through reviews, tweets, blog posts, ï¿½likes,ï¿½ ï¿½pins,ï¿½ images, video testimonials) is called ï¿½electronic word of mouthï¿½ (eWOM). t E-WoM among consumers can influence brand image and purchase intention but his study is limited to automobile manufacturers and does not cover other sectors. E-WoM has a strong impact on purchase intentions, especially when consumers use mobile internet to read online recommendations directly at the point of purchase (Srivastava & Sharma, 2017). eWOM represents one of the most significant developments in contemporary consumer behavior. With more than three billion consumers and seven billion devices connected to the Internet Inducing, collecting, and displaying eWOM have become priorities of many companies as part of their efforts to stimulate sales. According to Bain & Company (Babić Rosario et al., 2016). On the e-commerce sites eWOM is defined as ï¿½any positive or negative statement made by potential actual or former customers about a product or company which is made available to a multitude of people and institutions via the Internetï¿½ (Ali et al., 2020). The best example for eWOM in this current time would be as the following: I made a purchase on an online e commerce website based on how many positive reviews it had. No matter how much I wanted an that Item, if It was swarmed by bad reviews I wouldnï¿½t even come close to a purchase decision, The risk-relieving capability of favorable eWOM was found to enhance consumersï¿½ subjective acceptability (Liang 2018). Empirical findings suggest that online WoM has a strong impact on refraining from buying a product, followed by generating further WoM and buying a recommended product. Further, negative WoM has a greater impact on consumer buying behaviour than positive WoM (Srivastava & Sharma, 2017). Advantages, elements and applicable strategies to drive consumers to a purchase decision

Advantages within the usage of WOM and eWOM

The first benefit of word of mouth is that the business doesnï¿½t have to pay because it's free. Because someone else is doing the promotion without being asked, the business doesnï¿½t have to give that person anything in return. Therefore, this strategy is one of the potential strategies that can lower your promotional budget. Secondly, Consumers who recommend the product or brand are satisfied consumers. The peak proof of consumer satisfaction is when they want to invite others to the businessï¿½ product or service. Therefore, this strategy is one of the best marketing strategies to build a brand name. The more recommenders, the better our brand is in the eyes of the public. Third the benefit of Word of Mouth marketing strategy is a reflection of service performance in the eyes of consumers. As a brand or a business, it is important to hear and listen to what the customer or consumers have to say about our products, service or brand. If consumers are recommending us, it means that our service and performance are that of giving them satisfaction.

Applicable elements within WOM and eWOM

The first element of word of mouth is the process of educating consumers about the products you are selling. In order for the recommendation process to run well, consumers must be "made aware" of the advantages of the product. The way to make consumers understand the value of the product is to provide your best service to them. Secondly, Identifying Potential Consumers that might be able to Provide Recommendations, The relationship between seller and buyer does not only end in transactions. You must be able to establish a relationship with the customer even after the transaction. This step will help you to identify consumers, in whether they are potential targets who can provide word of mouth promotions later in the future. Third, Provision of Promotional Tools for Consumers. The next important element is to provide this promotional tool to consumers. This will make it easier for consumers to share information about your business. Some of the most common word of mouth tools are promotional brochures, leaflets, and so on, both in print or digital format. However if it were to be done so via Electronic Word of Mouth, Social media Marketing and also other online sites would be preferred to help. The next step would be how to research When, Where, and How Recommendations Are Given By knowing when, where, and how this strategy occurs, you will have information about the flow of word of mouth in the consumer network, and use it to create a strategy. This would be a great strategy if paired with CPIï¿½s, KPIï¿½s and other Digital marketing strategy options.ï¿½ For example, it turns out that all this time your product recommendations have occurred among mothers who are on social gathering. In order for the recommendation network to continue to repeat itself, you can provide special services to housewives consumers. Lastly, Listening and Responding to Consumer Opinions, When a customer voices his or her feelings about the service or product, The business should respond by listening carefully. These actions would make the consumer/ customers feel valued. By this way, future recommendation on the brand are to be expected.

WOMM strategies

Provide the best service to consumers the first word of mouth strategy is to provide the best service to consumers. This makes customers or consumers feel cared for and prioritized. When consumers are satisfied with your service, then without being asked they will promote your business to others. Ask Consumers to Give Testimonials, if the brand or business is new and quite unheard by the market, the first way to run a Word of Mouth marketing strategy is to ask consumers to provide testimonials. If the testimonials (feedback) given are good, the business can surely use them as promotional material to increase trust and assurance to the aimed market. Receive both positive and negative feedbacks from Consumers, itï¿½s not always that consumers will give good testimonials or feedbacks, sometimes the feedback that the business receives can even sound as if they are about to turn against the business. But that shouldn't be a problem for the business. On the contrary, the business is obliged to treat consumers who give bad testimonials or feedbacks better. Listen to their reasons for giving bad testimonials or feedbacks and take their suggestions for improvement. Provide Content for Consumers to Share, the next strategy that a business can do is to create content that consumers can share. The content here doesn't always have to be hard-selling content. The business can also create content to please consumers, such as fun fact contents and games or any other form of thing that can promote or make consumers share the following content. Buildings Interactions with Consumers on Social Media. Currently, building strong interactions with consumers on social media is one of the strongest examples of Electronic word of mouth (eWOM). Another name for this is engagement. By building consumer engagement on social media, you can directly demonstrate the intimacy of your interactions with consumers. Finally, other people who are not consumers will be curious about the product and become be drawn over to try the service or product of the business. Lastly, Using Key Opinion Leader (KOL) Strategy. In order for the word of mouth strategies to be successful, we can take advantage of the services of a Key Opinion Leader (KOL). A Key Opinion Leader (KOL) is someone who has in-depth knowledge and information related to a particular field so that they are trusted and respected by many people. An example of implementing this strategy is for example by hiring the services of a celebrity or influencer to promote a product.

Differences between WOM and eWOM on Purchase Decision

At this point we know that both Word of Mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) can act as drivers for consumers / customers to come into a purchase decision. Although, Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is considered by many to be the more ï¿½Modernï¿½ version of the Traditional Word of Mouth (WOM) there are some differences that may be able to separate these two very different categories. The first of such difference is credibility. Some reviews that are found on the internet may be biased or accordingly to as how the algorithm has been set. In certain e commerce sites power merchants or seller who have payed and are using these so called ï¿½packagesï¿½ offered by the e commerce site will receive an algorithm in which will try to conceal as many bad reviews as possible while for other sellers who donï¿½t use these packages will have 100% transparency right from the get go, the moment you click on one of their campaigns you will surely be able to see all the positive and negative reviews also if you go to sites such as food reviews and other various sites alike you might even be experiencing the same thing as such written before. While traditional Word of Mouth (WOM) will be more credible since the sources are surely within you day to day circle such as family, friends, colleagues etc. this however leads us to the second difference which is the amount of information shared on both categories. The amount of information gained from traditional Word Of Mouth (WOM) is limited to aï¿½ personï¿½s time and experience which sometimes fall short of what is expected to be a decent amount of information shared about an item or store, not to mention the relationship between the person sharing the information with the receiver which often might lead to a biased opinion, however this doesnï¿½t always happen and most of the time this sort of information sharing is relevant and also trustworthy and would lead to satisfaction after purchase. On the other hand the amount of information gained from Electronic Word Of Mouth (eWOM) is vast and only limited by how Keywords and search engine used. Most information found on the internet like reviews, are reliable and credible. Such as hotel reviews, restaurant reviews etc. however most of them are also biased and maybe a blackmail in order to bring down the sales of a certain restaurant or hotel that they have had a bad experience on. The third difference within Word of Mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is Message Privacy, y is another feature that sets the two media apart, since with traditional WOM information is shared through private, real-time, face-to-face dialogs and conversations. In contrast, information shared through eWOM is not private and can sometimes be seen by anonymous people who do not know each other. Furthermore, reviews can be viewed at various points in time Indeed, because eWOM reviews are written, consumers and companies can check them at any time; this stands in contrast to traditional WOM, where once the message has reached the receiver, it tends to disappear (Huete-Alcocer, 2017). Another salient difference between the two media is the speed of diffusion of the message; eWOM statements spread much faster than WOM statements because of where they are published, i.e., on the Internet (Gupta and Harris, 2010). Online platforms and sites are also one of the factors that set Word of Mouth (WOM) apart from Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) because the reviews are accessible by anyone from wherever they are and also because they are often updated and renewed by new customers. We consider engagement behavior as it relates to eWOM activity, in particular seeking and sharing eWOM. Therefore we define eWOM engagement as customersï¿½ behavioral manifestation to seek and share eWOM with other customers (Ali et al., 2020).

At the end of the day although both Word of Mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) is considered to be two separate categories. It is proven to still act as a main driver for consumers to come to a Purchase Decision regardless of it being used as an interpersonal way of communication nor via ICT (Information Communication Technology).

Conclusion

This paper has reviewed the literature with a view to providing a clearer understanding of Word of Mouth (WOM) and Electronic Word Of Mouth (eWOM) in the context of how it acts as a driver to help consumers develop a purchase decision. To this end this review has found that in numerous studies, both e-WOM and WOM are still one of the biggest drivers in pushing customers into coming into a purchase decision. No matter how technology advances, the human touch (or in this case communication or words or valences within oral and or written reviews) will always play a big role in the marketing mix.

Notwithstanding the above, the review of the theoretical framework has also revealed a gap in the literature on WOM credibility in situations involving multiple or many communicators and receivers, the relationship between the communicator and the receiver and how this ultimately affects the end consumer in sharing an information. This would include, for instance, situations in which one person communicates a message to another, who acts as an intermediary, both receiving the original message and passing it along to a third party. In such cases, the original message can be altered or distorted, making the credibility of the WOM review as a source of information questionable. This gives more leverage to written comments and reviews, such as eWOM, which can ultimately reduce risk and increase consumer confidence. As long as the written source of the eWOM is credible and reliable.

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Joshua Hezekiah Kairupan, Irmawan Rahyadi (2022)

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Syntax Literate: Jurnal Ilmiah Indonesia

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