Electronic word of mouth: antecedents and consequences

It is a well believed fact that the Word of Mouth marketing, is one of the most influential source for information transmission and dissemination, but the traditional WOM has a limited influence because of limited social contact boundaries. But the advancements in technology and proliferation of internet globally, facilitate consumers to share and exchange consumption related information which has a significant impact on their buying behaviors. Electronic word of mouth marketing, popularly called eWOM, has received significant attention from research scholars, academicians and practioners worldwide, who investigate and examine the effectiveness of eWOM communication. The growing interest in this area of research can be attributed to the increasing role and relevance of social media and its tools like blogs, discussion forums, online polls and surveys, feedback mechanisms, social networking sites(facebook, twitter) etc. Many studies have been conducted to look out for the factors that motivate people to share, talk and listen online. In this paper, a systematic review of literature on eWOM research has been done to identify the key antecedents and consequences of eWOM communication. The study has been conducted from the perspectives of two set of people-the senders of information and the receivers. A further attempt is made to explain the impact of eWOM communication on consumers’ behavior and implications for managers and firms. It is believed that the framework will provide an important foundation for future researches and related works to eWOM.