SOCIAL EMBEDDEDNESS AND CUSTOMER-GENERATED CONTENT: THE MODERATION EFFECT OF EMPLOYEE PARTICIPATION

Due to the rapid development of Web 2.0 technology, the Internet has changed how people communicate. Increasing numbers of customers generate content in online co-creation communities, and this co-creation between customers and companies has become a fashion trend. This study investigates the relationship between social embeddedness and the amount of customer-generated content and how employee participation moderates this relationship. We focus on structural embeddedness and relational embeddedness to measure social embeddedness. The amount of customer-generated content is assessed by the number of posts in a given community. The results indicate that both structural and relational embeddedness positively impact the amount of customer-generated content and that employee participation negatively moderates the relationship between structural embeddedness and the amount of customer-generated content. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.