An Exploratory Study on the Characteristics of Online Social Network and the Purpose of Customers' Use : A Comparison of Cyworld, Facebook, and Twitter

온라인 소셜 네트워크의 특성과 사용자의 이용 목적에 대한 탐색적 연구 : 싸이월드, 페이스북, 트위터간의 비교를 중심으로

As the number of SNS users is increasing, it has been very important how companies use SNS strategically. As a result, studies have been performed for the utilization of SNS. Most of the studies, however, focused on the overall characteristics of SNS and did not consider the characteristics of individual SNS. This study classified the main purpose of SNS use as relation-oriented purpose and information-oriented purpose, and identified the types of SNS from two viewpoints : service type and openness. Based on the classification, this study identified the characteristics of Cyworld, Facebook, and Twitter respectively, and analyzed the difference of the purpose of SNS users according to the characteristics of each service. The results showed that more users had the information-oriented purpose in the order of Twitter, Facebook, and Cyworld. There was no difference in the relation-oriented purpose among the three services. The analyses of the motive to join a group or a party made similar results. The results of additional analyses showed that the ratio of users with many acquaintances was high in the order of Facebook, Twitter, and Cyworld. In addition, more users checked their timeline or news feed more frequently in the order of Facebook, Twitter, and Cyworld.