【文章摘要】As a new driver of the e-commerce economy, the customer-to-manufacturer (C2M) model has attracted increasing attention. Product customization is a crucial element in C2M businesses; however, given manufacturers' relatively limited ability to serve end customers, it can create uncertainties for consumers. Scholars have paid insufficient attention to product customization on C2M platforms. Therefore, we developed a theoretical framework and crawled secondary data from Biyao, one of China's largest C2M platforms, to examine the role of product customization, as well as when product customization can be most effective. We used ordinary least squares regression analysis to test our hypotheses. The results demonstrate the positive effect of product customization on customer purchases on C2M platforms. Further, we investigated three moderating variables—brand awareness, lead time, and group buying. It is found that the positive effect of product customization on customer purchases is greater when brand awareness is higher and lead time is longer but weaker when products are sold through group buying.

【關鍵詞】Product customization；Customer purchases；Brand awareness；Lead time；Group buying；Signaling theory

【文章作者】王帥

【作者單位】北京信息科技大學(xué)經(jīng)濟管理學(xué)院

【發(fā)表期刊】Technological Forecasting & Social Change

【發(fā)表時(shí)間】2023年9月

【基金資助】This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 72072006, 72032004, 71725003], the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of UIBE, China [grant number 20YQ11], the School Research Fund in BISTU, China [grant number 2023XJJ20], National Social Science Foundation of China (21AJL013).