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Although digital content marketing (DCM) research and industry-wide expenditure is growing very rapidly owing to the positive outcomes associated with this new pull marketing strategy, research has not completely mapped how DCM activities can be optimized in the social media brand community context. This paper seeks to understand how social media DCM activities can be optimized to achieve greater relational and monetary outcomes for different products.

A structural equation modeling procedure was used to analyze 416 survey responses obtained from members of Facebook brand communities in South Africa.

The results reveal that social media DCM consumption motives exert significant differential effects on both relational and monetary marketing outcomes in search and experience product contexts while also demonstrating the mechanism through which social media DCM consumption motives lead to contributing social media engagement behaviors.

The study findings call for the need for firms to understand the motives that drive the consumption of DCM in social media brand communities. Specifically, marketers of search products should deploy more of hedonic contents such as images while simultaneously keeping highly textual DCM to a minimum in Facebook brand communities as this works better for experience products. Finally, more authentic SM-DCM activities that effectively address the authenticity SM-DCM consumption motive can result from the DCM activities of social media opinion leaders and genuine consumer–brand interactions in the context of Facebook brand communities.

This paper broke new grounds in three unique directions in terms of: (1) the relative salience of SM-DCM consumption motives in enhancing WTP and different aspects of SMBE; (2) the contextual influence of product type on SM-DCM activities optimization and (3) the mechanisms that underlie the effects of SM-DCM consumption motives on contributing SMBE in the Facebook brand community context.

In the quest to build a sense of human contact, e-retailers are increasingly depending on the scalability of chatbots to promote assistive dialogue during online shopping. Not much is known about the experiential value of customer interaction. This research proposes and evaluates a conceptual model for understanding the value perceptions emanating from the experiences of fashion shoppers utilising e-retail chatbots.

Data were collected using an online survey administered to 460 online panellists. Structural equation modelling was used to test the proposed research model.

Continued chatbot use intentions (CUIs) are influenced positively by perceived hedonic and utilitarian experiential value. Perceived social experiential value had a negative effect on shoppers’ continued intention to use the chatbot. Both perceived chatbot anthropomorphism and perceived chatbot intelligence positively and significantly affect shoppers’ experiential value while perceived chatbot risk yields a significantly negative effect.

By using conversational artificial intelligence chatbots, engagement at e-retail stores can be driven based on the user data and made more interactive.

The study introduces an e-retail chatbot model which asserts the power of selected chatbot attributes as catalysts of shoppers’ experiential value. Cumulatively, the model is a first-step approach providing a novel and balanced (both positive attributes and negative risks) view of chatbot continued use intentions.

Digital voice assistants (DVAs) are revolutionising consumers’ interactions with technology and businesses. Whilst research on the adoption of these devices is rapidly expanding, few have explored post-adoption behaviour. To fill this gap, we investigate how functionality and human-like features shape customers’ emotions, engagement and loyalty towards DVAs.

The data were collected through a self-administered online survey from 509 DVA users. Structural equation modelling was employed for data analysis.

The results reveal that distinct human-like and functional factors of DVA independently explain customers’ positive emotions and engagement with DVAs. Positive emotions and engagement significantly impact customer loyalty to DVAs. The study shows that localisation of DVAs has a significant positive moderating influence on the service experience-customer engagement relationship but a negative moderating influence on the anthropomorphism-customer engagement relationship.

Unlike previous research, this study contributes to the literature by delving into post-adoption phenomena. It explains how DVAs’ human-like and functional attributes drive customers’ positive emotional responses, engagement and loyalty towards DVAs. The findings not only unveil new insights into the moderating role of localisation but also provide a crucial understanding regarding the boundary conditions of the influence of anthropomorphism and service experience on customer engagement.