Social commerce and beyond: the role of WeChat in relationship marketing, gig economy, and responsible innovation

Lu, Y; Tong, Y; Alamanos, E; Papagiannidis, S

doi:10.4337/9781035345250.00015

Social commerce and beyond: the role of WeChat in relationship marketing, gig economy, and responsible innovation

Lookup NU author(s): Professor Eleftherios Alamanos ORCiD, Professor Savvas Papagiannidis ORCiD

Downloads

Full text for this publication is not currently held within this repository. Alternative links are provided below where available.

Abstract

WeChat, the most widely used mobile application in China, obtained 92.6% of the instant messaging market and 1.38 billion monthly active users by September 2024. It is an interactive social platform providing a broad range of online services for consumers’ day-to-day activities. WeChat accelerated Chinese society's move toward the era of social commerce and the gig economy, serving as a bridge between mobile commerce and social media, bringing together online and offline environments, and leveraging online social capital to support commercial transactions. Further, it makes new marketing techniques possible and offers enormous opportunities for micro- and small-business entrepreneurs, further facilitating the gig economy in China. This chapter presents a comprehensive review of the role of WeChat, one of the world's largest social media platforms, in social commerce, relationship marketing, and the gig economy, and identifies several implications for future research, marketers, and business practitioners