Unravelling the Determinants of Social Media Payment Platform (Smpp) Usage: A Qualitative Study on User Intentions and Adoption

Lately, social media companies worldwide have introduced payment features on their social media platforms. This has given social media users the option to make payments to their near and dear ones without changing the platform while engaged in chatting. The adoption of Social Media Payment Platforms (SMPP) varies across user groups and is influenced by socio-demographic characteristics, convenience, and perceived risk. Understanding these factors is essential for enhancing user engagement and trust, thereby addressing the gaps in current SMPP adoption research. The purpose of this study is to ascertain the behavioural intention and perception level of users toward Social Media Payment Platforms (SMPP) adoption and to identify the factors which motivate and inhibit from using social payment apps. To understand the intention of the users to behave and adopt SMPP, we conducted in-depth structured interviews. Qualitative analysis was used to analyse the data, using pre-defined categories (deductive) and code emerging from the respondent discussions (inductively) to identify the relevant influencing factors. Through data analysis, we identified three key themes that categorised user behaviour: socio-demographic, convivence and vulnerability to risks, which is further divided into several sub-themes such as age, gender, education, occupation under socio-demographic, while perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEOU) comes under the theme of convivence and lastly, under Vulnerability of risk includes privacy, security and platform features. The findings of the study can be validated and explored in future research, which will provide a clear understanding of identifying factors that influence SMPP adoption and behaviour intention.