Exploring features for digital social interaction between configurator users and their friends

The increasing popularity of online social network platforms allows people to produce and maintain social relations. By 2011, Facebook was the largest social networking site, producing 35 billion online friendships per year. Previous studies on social recommendation have posited that the potential of social relations can be exploited to complement recommender systems implemented in e-commerce environments by collecting social interactive feedback while users are shopping online (e.g., ratings, clicks, and favorites). Such arguments are based on the likelihood that individuals will seek suggestions from friends before making a purchase decision and that their friends consistently provide good recommendations. In the domain of e-commerce for self-customized products, online sales configurators (OSCs) have become connected to social software (SSW). Complementing a configurator with SSW converts it into a highly social interactive medium able to support users with digital interactions. Prior research in social product customization has not determined the extent to which active social interaction features in a product self-design environment respond to user needs for digital social feedback. By using analytical reasoning to compare results and conclusions from previous research, the present study shall investigate how connected OSC-SSW modalities support users in their digital interactions with friends while they are shopping via an OSC. Results from the present paper will describe current social interaction features in an online sales configurator environment and propose end-user interfaces that connect users with friends (trustworthy recommendation sources) during ongoing product configuration. The paper seeks to further the debate on social product customization systems by providing insight on implementing interactive features that respond properly to configurator user demand for digital social interaction.