Information Revelation and Social Learning
Juheng Zhang

Abstract
Most often information provided by sellers or companies is limited. Facing limited information, consumers are turning their attention to social media for more information when making decisions. People read reviews and ratings of products and learn from others’ experience. Businesses have started to use social media as a powerful communication tool. This study investigates how reviewers reveal information through social media. The findings show information asymmetry exists in market. Online ratings and evaluations on user generated content websites functions as a supplementary source of product and service information, and moderates the information discrepancy between consumers and companies. This study also finds that business reputation is significantly affected by customer satisfaction. In addition, a new design of reputation ranking system, which is parsimonious and has high degree of consistency, is suggested for existing online rating platforms to consider the adoption.

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