Low-price live-streaming shopping (LSS) creates a psychological tension between seeking a “good deal” and product-quality concerns. This study explains how low-price tactics and heterogeneous real-time diagnostic cues shape acquisition and transaction value and how both relate to continued purchase intention.
This study draws on acquisition-transaction utility theory and the accessibility-diagnosticity model to develop a research model. Survey data from 435 repeat buyers on Facebook Live are analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).
Both acquisition and transaction value showed significant positive paths to continued purchase intention, with a larger estimated coefficient for transaction value. Discounts and smart-shopper feelings were both positively associated with acquisition and transaction value, with higher point estimates for smart-shopper feelings. This pattern is consistent with a self-evaluative route alongside the monetary role of price discounts. Real-time diagnostic cues showed differentiated patterns. Streamer-provided vicarious experience was positively related to both value dimensions. Positive word-of-mouth (WOM) diagnosticity showed a significant path only to transaction value, whereas negative WOM diagnosticity showed a significant path only to acquisition value.
This study frames value construction in low-price LSS as a dual-dimensional process. Within this process, the diagnostic relevance of real-time cues varies across product-worth and deal-attractiveness judgments. The study also identifies smart-shopper feelings as a self-evaluative basis of value formation alongside objective price cues.
