摘要：The main purpose of the paper is to identify the importance of social media in e-WoM (electronic word of mouth) in relation to the two stages of consumer behavior,pre-purchase and post-consumption,in groups of different gender and countries.The article answers three research questions.Whether the frequency of using the most popular social media influences the range of using them in e-WoM among individual users? Which stage of consumer behavior process is more dependent on social media,pre-purchase or post-consumption? Do any differences exist between men and women in the scope under consideration?Methodology: The analysis bases on literature studies and empirical data collected among 1246 respondents from four countries: China,Poland,the United States of America,and Turkey.Findings: General conclusions show differences between these countries in relation to the use of social media for e-WoM.Moreover,results confirmed the findings of literature analysis wherever consumers used social media at the stage of looking for information and advice about products (pre-purchase).Gender appeared as a significant differentiating factor that influences e-WoM behavior.Research limitations: The design of the research (samples’ size and sampling method) could place some limits on the capacity of the study to generalize the results to other national contexts.Research implications: The results offer information for marketers who use social media communication to build brands’ loyalty in the international marketplace and individuals who rely on experiences shared through social media.Originality: The content of the paper is important,timely,original,and focusses on the subject infrequently studied in the literature.The information from the paper applies to numerous groups of stakeholders.
