Do Social Networks Improve e-Commerce? A Study on Social - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Do Social Networks Improve e-Commerce? A Study on Social - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Jul 11, 2023 324 likes •532 views

Do Social Networks Improve e-Commerce? A Study on Social Marketplaces 1 GAYATRI SWAMYNATHAN, CHRISTO WILSON , BRYCE BOE, KEVIN ALMEROTH AND BEN Y. ZHAO UC SANTA BARBARA Current Lab @ UCSB Leveraging Online Social Networks 2 Online

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GAYATRI SWAMYNATHAN, CHRISTO WILSON, BRYCE BOE, KEVIN ALMEROTH AND BEN Y. ZHAO UC SANTA BARBARA

Do Social Networks Improve e-Commerce? A Study on Social Marketplaces

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Leveraging Online Social Networks

 Online communities in the Web 2.0 era

 Facebook – ~90 million users  Myspace – ~110 million users  Orkut – ~60 million users

 Question: can friends-of-friends networks be leveraged

  • utside social networks?

 Examples

 Internet Search  Spam Filtering  Online marketplaces…?  Enhanced reputation systems  Sybil Protection

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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What’s Wrong With Online Marketplaces?

 Man arrested in huge eBay fraud – MSNBC 2003

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3078461/

 eBay urged to tackle fraud better – BBC 2006

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4749806.stm

 Fraud abroad remains 'uphill battle' for eBay – CNET 2008

http://news.cnet.com/Fraud-abroad-remains-uphill-battle-for-eBay/2100-7348_3-6233893.html

 Tacoma woman’s house emptied after Craigslist hoax – The

Seattle Times 2007

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003652872_webhouse05m.html

 Escrow fraud ruining Craigslist? – ZDNet 2008

http://blogs.zdnet.com/threatchaos/?p=519

 Bottom Line –

 Online markets plagued by fraud  Feedback-based reputation systems ineffective

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Social Marketplaces and Overstock.com

 Online marketplaces that incorporate social networks  Hypothesis: transactions with social friends will have

higher satisfaction.

 Are people actually using this capability?  Measure transaction volume vs. path length  Do social networks actually improve satisfaction?  Measure satisfaction vs. path length

 Overstock Auctions

 Started in 2004

 Similar to eBay  Buyers leave feedback after each transaction  Incorporates social components  Comment and leave ratings on friend’s profiles  Message boards  “How am I connected?” button

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Methodology

 Analyze overall network structure of Overstock

 Connectivity of all 431,705 users provided by Overstock  Two networks:

 “Personal” – connecting friends  “Business” – automatically connects users who transact

 Correlating structure with transactions

 Two questions:

  • 1. What correlates transactions: Business or Social connectivity?
  • 2. What is the impact of path length on transaction satisfaction?

 Crawled transaction history of ~10,000 users  ~18,000 total transactions

 Overall feedback for each user  Feedback for individual transactions

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Do Social Networks Improve e-Commerce?

Outline

  • 1. Connectivity graph analysis
  • 2. What correlates transactions?

Social vs. Business path lengths

  • 3. Impact of path lengths on transaction satisfaction

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Connectivity Graph Analysis

Business Network Social Network Total Nodes 398,989 85,200 Total Links 1,926,553 1,895,100

  • Avg. Node Degree

4.82 22.24

Social network 32,716 nodes (8%) Business network 346,505 nodes (80%)

52,484 nodes (12%)  82% of users have < 1% overlap

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Connectivity is Heterogeneous

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Current Lab @ UCSB

50% of users have less than 10 friends and/or transaction partners. Business network has lesser degree

  • verall.
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Do Social Networks Improve e-Commerce?

Outline

  • 1. Connectivity graph analysis
  • 2. What correlates transactions?

Social vs. Business path lengths

  • 3. Impact of path lengths on transaction satisfaction

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Transaction Volume vs. Path Length

 Question: is there a correlation between social

distance and buying decisions?

 Compare transaction volume to network path length

 For each transaction, compute hops between buyer and seller  Business network – Connectivity is almost guaranteed

 For partners with multiple transactions, path length = 1  Otherwise, remove 1-hop edge and calculate distance

 Social network – Connectivity is NOT guaranteed!  Not all users are present in the Social Network 10

Current Lab @ UCSB

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Observations on Transaction Volume

Volume vs. path lengths for 17,376 transactions

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Current Lab @ UCSB

20% of transactions

  • ccur between

repeat buyers. At most, 20% of transactions can be accounted for on the Social network. Most transactions occur between close Business network neighbors. Almost no transactions occur between friends. Social network is smaller; is underutilized for making transaction decisions.

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Do Social Networks Improve e-Commerce?

Outline

  • 1. Connectivity graph analysis
  • 2. What correlates transactions?

Social vs. Business path lengths

  • 3. Impact of path lengths on transaction

satisfaction

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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 Question: does social distance influence transaction

satisfaction?

  • Transaction success percentage vs. path lengths for

17,376 transactions

 Example transactions:  Satisfied = [+1, +2]

Impact of Path Lengths on Satisfaction

Seller Buyer Transaction ID Date Rating (-2 to +2) A B 123 2/19/2005 +2 A B 234 12/17/2004 +2 A C 345 12/15/2004 B D 456 12/2/2004

  • 1

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Observations on Personal Network

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Friendship is a choice! Bad sellers/fraudsters are naturally excluded from Social network. Chain of satisfaction holds at long social distances. Near 100% satisfaction rate between friends. 90% average satisfaction for distances <= 5.

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Observations on Business Network

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Current Lab @ UCSB

Near 100% satisfaction rate for repeat buyers. Close to 0% satisfaction at larger distances! Business connections are automatic! Business networks includes all transaction partners ever. This includes partners who you were unsatisfied with! Chain of satisfaction does not hold at long distances.

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Conclusions

 Social links underutilized for making

transaction decisions

 Most users do not participate in the social marketplace  8% of users are purely social  80% users not present in the Social network  Those who do separate business from friends  Very few transactions between friends  Little overlap of between Social and Business networks

 Room for growth!

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Current Lab @ UCSB

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Conclusions, cont.

Current Lab @ UCSB

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 Social networks increase user satisfaction

 Success rates at long distances are higher on Social

network

 Social linkage is a choice, cheaters are quickly excluded

 Fraudsters necessarily must use many fake accounts  These accounts rarely become well connected in Social network

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Conclusions, cont.

Current Lab @ UCSB

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 Social networks are an excellent way to avoid bad

sellers

 User education is needed  Get more people involved socially  Encourage businesses to interact socially  Better advertising, more features for existing services  Ebay: Favorite sellers and Neighborhoods  Amazon Profiles  Facebook Marketplace

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Thanks for Listening!

Questions?

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Current Lab @ UCSB