The Influence of Influencer Marketing and E-WOM on Skintific Purchase Intention via Consumer Trust on TikTok Shop

Abstract

The rapid growth of social commerce in Indonesia through TikTok Shop has prompted global skincare brands such as Skintific to rely on influencer marketing and electronic word-of-mouth (E-WOM) to reach consumers, although consumer trust in the combination of these two strategies does not necessarily form automatically. This study aims to analyze the influence of influencer marketing and E-WOM on purchase intention, with consumer trust as an intervening variable. A quantitative causal-associative approach was employed using Structural Equation Modeling-Partial Least Squares (SEM-PLS) on 200 active TikTok users who had been exposed to Skintific content, selected through purposive sampling and analyzed with SmartPLS 3. The results show that influencer marketing and E-WOM have a positive and significant effect on consumer trust and purchase intention, and consumer trust is proven to partially mediate the influence of both on purchase intention. The model explains 77.2 percent of the variance in consumer trust and 70.6 percent of the variance in purchase intention. The study concludes that influencer marketing and E-WOM are effective digital marketing strategies for building trust and driving consumer purchase intention within the social commerce ecosystem.