Knowledge Management and Innovation: The Role of Virtual Social Networks in Innovative Consumer Behavior

Abstract

Online social networks made up of actors with different degrees of innovativeness may allow knowledge management to collect new ideas and measure their acceptance. This research investigates consumer innovativeness and relationships with the uses and participation in social networks. This research has a quantitative exploratory scope, and among the main findings, we can mention that the dimensions of the adopted scale were corroborated by using factor analysis. The findings cannot be generalized, but there are evidences that relationship between social networking and innovative consumer behavior exists. Although there are limitations, correlations were found between the social dimension of innovativeness and information search in the networks and also the use of social networking information for the decision to purchase new products.

Keywords

• online social networks
• web-based innovation
• innovation
• knowledge management.