When live-streaming fails: Influencer coping strategies, improvisational responses, and consumer purchase intention

Live-streaming e-commerce is developing rapidly worldwide and has become a major channel for online retail. Influencers are responsible for introducing and recommending products and are regarded as the core elements of live-streaming e-commerce. Nevertheless, they inevitably face service failures. The live-streaming flop represents a quintessential failure in this field. Existing research recognizes two coping strategies: apology and stealing thunder. However, there is a lack of comparison in the effectiveness differences between them. Additionally, excuses frequently serve as improvisational responses employed by influencers when a live-streaming flop occurs, but their role remains unclear. This study, from the perspective of psychological contract violation, discusses the differences in coping strategies for live-streaming flop and the role of excuses, and addresses the aforementioned research gap with three studies involving a total of 761 participants. The findings reveal that, compared with apology, the stealing thunder strategy is more effective in mitigating psychological contract violations caused by live-streaming flop, and thus can better maintain purchase intention. Furthermore, it is found that excuses interact with coping strategies. The use of an excuse in an apology can enhance purchase intention by reducing psychological contract violations, while the opposite effect occurs with the stealing thunder strategy. New insights into the theory and practice of recovery strategies for service failures within live-streaming e-commerce are offered by these findings.