The Impact of Social Media on Buying Behaviour of Consumers

Introduction
Social media has become one of the most essential things in people’s lives. Nowadays,
there are 3,96 billion people in the world who are using social media (Dean, 2021). Social
media itself is a multimedia medium that helps people to build and exchange content easily
with the public. Instagram, Twitter, Google, Youtube, TikTok, and Line are some of the
examples of social media. In providing, receiving and sharing information without any
restriction, any social media site plays a part. Social networking as a communication medium
has held a significant role. People around the world use social media to connect to others.
Social networking is an online contact platform for feedback, engagement and content
sharing depending on the culture. The emergence of technology, high-specialty internet
connectivity and ease of internet shopping demonstrates that consumers respond to web ads
and are subsequently affected by their purchasing behaviour. Social media is used in the
industry to sell goods, to support brands and connect to existing clients and to inspire new
businesses. Social networking uses social media to improve the visibility and reach of a
company's clients. Social media can also be a place that makes a lot of money. People have
many connections in social media, which means that many people ingest content. This
knowledge would have an effect on customers and their shopping behaviour. Many more
consumers today than ever are in social media networks. Consumers are seeking feedback
and guidance. Study reports have shown that many consumers are dependent on social media
knowledge and feedback to schedule potential transactions. Social media can affect
prospective buyers from the outset to the buying stage and beyond. Consumer behaviour is
the study of the preference and disposition of ideas, goods and services, by individual
consumers, organisations or associations, to fulfil their needs. It applies to the behaviour and
underlying motivations of customers in the marketplace. According to Smriti Chand (n.d.),
‘Consumer behaviour is the study of how individual customers, groups or organizations
select, buy, use, and dispose of ideas, goods, and services to satisfy their needs and wants. It
refers to the actions of the consumers in the marketplace and the underlying motives for those
actions.’
The main reason for this study is to examine the impact of social media on the buying
behaviour of consumers. This research is aiming to investigate whether or not social media
can affect consumer’s buying behaviour and how it can affect consumers’ decision towards
buying a product.
Literature review
Research by Hajli (2014) found out that social media’s promotion has a great impact
on affecting consumers’ purchase intention. This has made social media to be one of the best
option company picks to promote its product. Social media also allow social interaction
between consumers by giving feedback, review, etc. Kour & Kaur (2020) said that a positive
review written in social media can impact consumers’ buying behaviour and gaining
consumers’ trust is another essential things as it can predict a buying behaviour as well.
Research by George Herbert Walker (2018) proves that social media users found decision-
making to be easier and enjoyed the process more when compared to those who used other
information sources. A study by Kim and Kim (2017) also indicated that social media use is
positively associated with college students communication network heterogeneity, which, in
turn, is positively related to social capital and subjective well-being. Moreover, there are a
few stages consumers will be categorised into when they are planning to buy something.
According to Noureddine & Zeineddine (2018), there are 5 different stages that can affect
consumers’ buying decision which are problem recognition, information search, decisions
making, final decision, and post-purchase decision. Those 5 stages can affect consumers’
decision as it might make them think, evaluate, and change their decision regarding their
intention to buy one certain product. However, social media usage can also be a negative
thing in term of the relation it can make between the customers’ action. A study by Xhema
(2019) identifies that there are 3 different types of customers’ behaviour exist. This study
found out that social media can affect customer loyalty, customer tolerance, and customer
experimenting in both a positive or negative way. Furthermore, this study also discovered
that there is a two-way communication in which when customers are intolerant when dealing
with overpricing or bad service, they do not consider to buy that product again in the future,
and also, some customers tend to buy a product without seeing it first.

Methodology
This report seeks to provide customers and entrepreneurs with a better view of when,
where and how social media have affected decision-making. This research is using a
technique of quantitative method which is a questionnaire to collect the data. This sampling
method was adopted in order to gather their information and opinions real quick. The
questionnaires are distributed to random students at USCI University in Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia. In order to gather data from a larger community, this data collection approach is
chosen. The types of questions used in the questioner are structured as multiple choice
questions, yes or no questions, and likert scales. The questions posed in multiple choices
required respondents to respond to questions applicable to the sample. The function of yes or
no question is to get answers in essence by people answering either yes or no. Likert scales
are commonly used for assessing behaviours and beliefs with more complexities than just
"yes or no." As a way to collect input from survey respondents, questions were chosen
because surveys make it possible to reproduce viewpoints shared, including answers to
questionnaires to allow students to exchange perspectives on problems and also to assess
particular variables in a sample. Another advantage researcher can get from using
questionnaires is that it allows a large amount of information to be gathered from a huge
number of respondents in a short period of time. Moreover, questionnaires based data
collection is also easier for respondents to answer compared to an interview because it puts
less pressure on respondents. Once the data is collected, the result of the questionnaire is also
easier to be quantified. This is done so that the researcher is able to find the impact of social
media on consumer buying behaviour.

References
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Hajli, M. N. (2014). A study of the impact of social media on consumers. International
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Kim, B. & Kim, Y. (2017). College students’ social media use and communication network
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Noureddine, O. M. & Zeineddine, R. B. (2018.) Social Media and its Impression on
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