Understanding eWOM of Chinese Governments information service: a perceived value-based perspective

What is it about?

In a people-oriented society, it is necessary to understand the eWOM of information service of the government. Government affair microblogs, which plays an important role in orienting online opinions, listening to public voices, establishing government image, is an ideal channel to achieve this goal. In essence, the application of government affair microblogs is to improve the communication efficiency between the government and the public. Studying the influence factors of government affair microblogs’ eWOM will not only benefits the government in better understanding the information dissemination rules of microblogs but also provides directions for the government to improve the information service over microblogs. In this paper, we investigate and verify the regulating function, herd effect applied on government affair microblogs. We conduct an innovative empirical study based on perceived value theory, aiming to explore the factors that influence the eWOM of the Chinese government. Experiments on 502 government affair microblogs users show that social identification positively affects perceived value while effort cost negatively affects perceived value, and perceived value positively influences the microblogs’ eWOM. We also find that the herd effect positively regulates the relationship between perceived value and government affair microblogs’ eWOM. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed. In this research, the regulating effect of herd effect on the relationship between perceived value and government affair microblogs’ eWOM has been explored. This study also provides inspirations for future government information service research and administrative measurement.

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