Impact of Social Media on Students’ Pre-purchase Decision Making Process

Abstract

The study’s general objective was to establish the impact of social media on students’ pre-purchase decision-making process (A case study of United International University). The study was guided by the following a specific objective: to find out how social media influences the pre-purchase stage in buyers' decision-making process.The descriptive research design was used for the study. The total student for this study was 40. The study was undertaken using a random sampling technique, and the student was responded by the questionnaires to collect data. The data was interpreted with the use of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS).

The results of the findings designate that social media has an impact on the respondent’s pre-purchase stage. The respondents decided that social media provides them with external incentives to recognize the need for something before purchasing. Social media does trigger their need to purchase through advertisements it displays, provides them with ideas or resolutions to address what to buy, where to buy, why to buy through interaction with peer/friends, and offers enhanced easy information exploration about different products and services.