Influence of Social Media Adverts on Consumer Behaviour of Public Service Employees in Ibadan North Local Government, Oyo state

Consumer shopping behavior in social media differs from the traditional retail environment and is fuelled by the diverse types of adverts of products, services, and ideas through organizational websites and social media, and marketers. The study therefore attempts to understand how social media adverts influence the consumer behavior of public service employees in Ibadan. Primary data from respondents in Ibadan North local government was employed for the study. Social media users were targeted and conveniently sampled for the study. In all, relevant information elicited from 88 respondents using a well-structured questionnaire were analyzed using a quantitative approach. The results shows that most of the respondents had been responding regularly to social media adverts, and also intend to continue responding to the advert in the future. Majority of the respondents believed that social media adverts help them make decision better before purchasing and that their decision to buy a given product depends on recommendation by friends or their perceived value of the product. The study found out that perceived ease of use was the major factor that significantly predicts consumers’ behavioral intention to use social media adverts. The study therefore recommends that online retailers should work towards increasing public service employees’ trust in online stores by advertising accurately the features of the products and services in the adverts so that consumers’ expectations of the advertised and sold products and services can be met or exceeded.