Cover not available
Article published In:
Pragmatics
Vol. 33:4 (2023) ► pp.592–617

How broadcasters enhance rapport with viewers in live streaming commerce

A genre-based discourse analysis

| University of International Business and Economics
ORCID logo | University of International Business and Economics
Despite the increasing research interest, the existing literature on live streaming commerce as a new e-commerce mode is still in its infancy. Based on 100 live streaming commerce videos from the top two broadcasters on Taobao Live in China, this study conducted a genre-based discourse analysis to investigate the move pattern in this new genre. The study draws on rapport management theory to scrutinize the linguistic functions of the moves, to explore how the broadcasters managed to enhance broadcaster-viewer relationship. Our findings may further our understanding of live streaming commerce as a new form of digital genre, and shed light on how successful broadcasters may strategically manage their relationship with viewers through well-organized discourse forms. Theoretically, the present research may contribute to the literature of employing rapport management theory in the discourse domain by extending it into a new digital genre analysis. Practically, our findings may provide implications for relevant practitioners.
Keywords: rapport management, live streaming commerce, successful broadcasters, broadcaster-viewer relationship, move analysis, Taobao Live
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
    • 2.1Research on live streaming commerce
    • 2.2Genre and move analysis
    • 2.3Rapport management theory
  • 3.Methods
    • 3.1Data collection
    • 3.2Data coding
    • 3.3Data analysis
  • 4.Findings
    • 4.1Moves in live streaming commerce
    • 4.2Broadcaster-viewer relationship building in the moves
      • Greeting
      • Introducing
      • Promoting
      • Sharing
      • Presenting
      • Recommending
      • Stimulating
      • Instructing
      • Real-time Q&A
      • Self-promoting
      • Appreciating
      • Apologizing
      • Soliciting attention
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • References
Published online: 1 December 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/prag.22009.shi
References (41)
References
Andersson, Marta. 2021. “The Climate of Climate Change: Impoliteness as a Hallmark of Homophily in YouTube Comment Threads on Greta Thunberg’s Environmental Activism.” Journal of Pragmatics 1781: 93–107. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bhatia, Vijay. 2004. Worlds of Written Discourse: A Genre-based View. London: Continuum.Google Scholar
Biber, Douglas, Ulla Connor, and Thomas Upton (eds). 2007. Discourse on the Move: Using Corpus Linguistics to Describe Discourse Structure. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chen, Chia-Chen, and Yi-Chen Lin. 2018. “What Drives Live-Stream Usage Intention? The Perspectives of Flow, Entertainment, Social Interaction, and Endorsement.” Telematics and Informatics 35 (1): 293–303. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chen, Hongquan, Shuhua Zhang, Bingjia Shao, Wei Gao, and Yujin Xu. 2022. “How Do Interpersonal Interaction Factors Affect Buyers’ Purchase Intention in Live Stream Shopping? The Mediating Effects of Swift Guanxi.” Internet Research 32 (1): 335–361. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Clark, Colin, Paul Drew, and Trevor Pinch. 2003. “Managing Prospect Affiliation in Real-life Encounters.” Discourse Studies 5 (1): 5–31. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Deng, Liming, Tania Laghari, and Xiaoping Gao. 2021. “A Genre-based Exploration of Intertextuality and Interdiscursivity in Advertorial Discourse.” English for Specific Purposes 621: 30–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Guo, Yuanyuan, Kexin Zhang, and Chaoyou Wang. 2022. “Way to Success: Understanding Top Streamers’ Popularity and Influence from the Perspective of Source Characteristics.” Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services 641: 102786. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ho, Victor. 2017a. “Giving Offense and Making Amends: How Hotel Management Attempts to Manage Rapport with Dissatisfied Customers.” Journal of Pragmatics 1091: 1–11. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2017b. “Achieving Service Recovery through Responding to Negative Online Reviews.” Discourse & Communication 11 (1): 31–50. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hu, Mingyao, and Sohail S. Chaudhry. 2021. “Enhancing Consumer Engagement in e-Commerce Live Streaming via Relational Bonds.” Internet Research 30 (3): 1019–1041. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kang, Kai, Jinxuan Lu, Lingyun Guo, and Wenlu Li. 2021. “The Dynamic Effect of Interactivity on Customer Engagement Behavior through Tie Strength: Evidence from Live Streaming Commerce Platforms.” International Journal of Information Management 561: 102251. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kozlenkova, Irina V., Robert W. Palmatier, Eric Fang, Bangming Xiao, Minxue Huang. 2017. “Online Relationship Formation.” Journal of Marketing 81 (3): 21–40. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Labrador, Belén, Noelia Ramón, Héctor Alaiz-Moretón, and Hugo Sanjurjo-González. 2014. “Rhetorical Structure and Persuasive Language in the Subgenre of Online Advertisements.” English for Specific Purposes 341: 38–47. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lam, Phoenix W. Y. 2013. “Interdiscursivity, Hypertextuality, Multimodality: A Corpus-based Multimodal Move Analysis of Internet Group Buying Deals.” Journal of Pragmatics 511: 13–39. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Liao, Junyun, Keyi Chen, Jun Qi, Ji Li, and Irina Y. Yu. 2022. “Creating Immersive and Parasocial Live Shopping Experience for Viewers: The Role of Streamers’ Interactional Communication Style.” Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing (Early Access). DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lin, Chih-Ying. 2020. “Exploring Judges’ Compliments and Criticisms on American, British, and Taiwanese Talent Shows.” Journal of Pragmatics 1601: 44–59. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ma, Yingying. 2021. “‘To Shop or Not: Understanding Chinese Consumers’ Live-Stream Shopping Intentions from the Perspectives of Uses and Gratifications, Perceived Network Size, Perceptions of Digital Celebrities, and Shopping Orientations.” Telematics and Informatics 591: 101562. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Moreno, Ana I., and John M. Swales. 2018. “Strengthening Move Analysis Methodology Towards Bridging the Function-Form Gap.” English for Specific Purposes 501: 40–63. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Morrow, Phillip R., and Kenta Yamanouchi. 2020. “Online Apologies to Hotel Guests in English and Japanese.” Discourse, Context & Media 341:1–10. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Park, Sanghee, Jihyeon Jeon, and Eunsook Shim. 2021. “Exploring Request Emails in English for Business Purposes: A Move Analysis.” English for Specific Purposes 631: 137–150. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Recktenwald, Daniel. 2017. “Toward a Transcription and Analysis of Live Streaming on Twitch.” Journal of Pragmatics 1151: 68–81. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sampietro, Agnese. 2019. “Emoji and Rapport Management in Spanish WhatsApp Chats.” Journal of Pragmatics 1431: 109–120. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Singh, Reema, and Sara Rosengren. 2020. “Why Do Online Grocery Shoppers Switch? An Empirical Investigation of Drivers of Switching in Online Grocery.” Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services 531: 101962. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Skjuve, Marita, and Petter Bae Brandtzaeg. 2019. “Facebook Live: A Mixed-Methods Approach to Explore Individual Live Streaming Practices and Motivations on Facebook.” Interacting with Computers 31 (6): 589–602. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Spencer-Oatey, Helen (ed). 2000. Culturally Speaking: Managing Rapport through Talk across Cultures. London: Continuum. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2005. “(Im)Politeness, Face and Perceptions of Rapport: Unpackaging Their Bases and Interrelationships.” Journal of Politeness Research 1 (1): 95–119. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(ed). 2008. Culturally Speaking: Culture, Communication and Politeness Theory. London: Continuum.Google Scholar
Sun, Yuan, Xiang Shao, Xiaotong Li, Yue Guo, and Kun Nie. 2019. “How Live Streaming Influences Purchase Intentions in Social Commerce: An IT Affordance Perspective.” Electronic Commerce Research and Applications 371: 100886. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Swales, John M. 1981. Aspects of Article Introductions. Birmingham: University of Aston.Google Scholar
2004. Research Genres: Explorations and Application. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Upton, Thomas A., and Mary Ann Cohen. 2009. “An Approach to Corpus-Based Discourse Analysis: The Move Analysis as Example.” Discourse Studies 11 (5): 585–605. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wongkitrungrueng, Apiradee, Nassim Dehouche, and Nuttapol Assarut. 2020. “Live Streaming Commerce from the Sellers’ Perspective: Implications for Online Relationship Marketing.” Journal of Marketing Management 36 (5–6): 488–518. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wongkitrungrueng, Apiradee, and Nuttapol Assarut. 2020. “The Role of Live Streaming in Building Consumer Trust and Engagement with Social Commerce Sellers.” Journal of Business Research 1171: 543–556. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Xu, Ping, Bang-jun Cui and Bei Lyu. 2022. “Influence of Streamer’s Social Capital on Purchase Intention in Live Streaming E-Commerce.” Frontiers in Psychology 121: 748172. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Xu, Xiaoyu. 2022. “A Genre-Based Analysis of Questions and Comments in Q&A Sessions after Conference Paper Presentations in Computer Science.” English for Specific Purposes 661: 63–76. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zhang, Mingli, Yafei Liu, Yu Wang, and Lu Zhao. 2022. “How to Retain Customers: Understanding the Role of Trust in Live Streaming Commerce with a Socio-Technical Perspective.” Computers in Human Behavior 1271. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zhang, Yi, and Camilla Vásquez. 2014. “Hotels’ Responses to Online Reviews: Managing Consumer Dissatisfaction.” Discourse, Context & Media 61: 54–64. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zhou, Sijing. 2012. “‘Advertorials’: A Genre-based Analysis of an Emerging Hybridized Genre.” Discourse & Communication 6 (3): 323–346. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zhu, Weihua. 2014. “Rapport Management in Strong Disagreement: An Investigation of a Community of Chinese Speakers of English.” Text & Talk 34 (5): 641 – 664. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zhu, Wuhan. 2016. “A Cross-cultural Pragmatic Study of Rapport-Management Strategies in Chinese and English Academic Upward Request Emails.” Language and Intercultural Communication 17 (2): 210–228. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (2)

Cited by two other publications

Song, Chuting & Xinren Chen
2024. Veteran Chinese traffic police officers’ positive rapport management in discourse: A case study. Journal of Pragmatics 230 ► pp. 142 ff. DOI logo
Li, Meiqi & Ting Jiang
2023. Exerting power through interruptions: A case study of arbitrators’ discourses in Chinese Arbitral Tribunals. Discourse Studies DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 21 september 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.