Vulnerability on collaborative networks and customer engagement: defending the online customer experience from fake reviews

The aim of this work is to find out if a customer's vulnerability to fake reviews can influence customer engagement, intention to adopt information and propensity to purchase on online review sites in order to safeguard the online customer experience from malicious marketing actions. This is very important today since fake reviews can unconsciously condition the purchasing and consumption choices of internet users. Despite the importance attributed to customer vulnerability as a determining factor in the adoption of malicious marketing practices, past research has not yet verified whether this vulnerability has any influence on the engagement processes or on the intentions of the readers of reviews during online decision-making processes. To address this gap in the research, this study proposes to test a multiple regression model that measures the relationship between vulnerability factors, customer engagement, the adoption of information and the purchase intention. A survey was administered to a sample of 183 American online review readers. https://www.yelp.com was chosen as a platform for restaurant reviews and hypothesis testing. The results show that vulnerability is a factor that acts both on customer engagement during the reading of review websites and on the customer’s choices. The characteristics of the review messages also seem to have an effect, above all on the intention to adopt the information. This study confirms the importance of testing the veracity of online reviews on review sites, especially since they affect customer engagement and purchase intentions.