Literature Review Since the 1960s, extensive marketing research has documented the pervasive impact of word of mouth on attitudes and behavior consumers (Bansal & Voyer, 2000; Bone, 1995; Buttle, 1998; Herr et al., 1991; Laczniak, DeCarlo and Ramaswani, 2001; Word of mouth (WOM) communication is recognized as an important means of influencing consumer consumer behavior (Arndt, 1967). Consumers are generally more likely to be exposed to sources dominated by marketers. Therefore, personal word of mouth was generally the most effective (Arndt, 1967). previous research has also shown that word of mouth is particularly important for service (Murray, 1991) and also sufficient to persuade a person to try a particular service provider (Frenzen & Davis, 1990; Reingen, 1987). WOM is widely accepted, but considerable research gaps exist. First, the forces determining the effectiveness of WOM effects are not well understood (Wangenheim & Bayom, 2002). Although some authors have discussed the effects of characteristics of the communicator (such as expertise or similarity; Brown and Reingen, 1987; Price et al., 1989) or the relationship between the communicator (such as tie strength; Raluca, 2012) on Due to the strength of influence of a reference, the interaction of these two groups of factors remains largely understudied. Marketing research on the determinants of word-of-mouth conceptualizes word-of-mouth as dyadic communication between a source (i.e., sender) and a recipient (i.e., a receptor) (Gilly et al., 1998). This implies that the occurrence of word-of-mouth is determined by the characteristics of the recipient, by the characteristics of the source and by their mutual relationship...... middle of paper ...... relationship is defined such as the closeness of the social relationship between the recipient and the source of word-of-mouth information (Brown and Konrad, 2001). Close friends are an example of strong ties, while rarely contacted acquaintances represent weak ties (Brown and Reingen, 1987). Stronger ties are generally more readily available and result in more frequent interactions through which word-of-mouth information can be requested or provided (Gilly et al., 1998). Several studies have shown that consumers engage more in word-of-mouth with strong ties than with weak ties (Bansal & Voyer, 2000; Bone, 1992; Wirtz & Chew, 2002). To conclude the discussion above, how effective is word of mouth? The effectiveness of word of mouth in influencing consumer behavior depends on the characteristics of the source, the characteristics of the resources and the strength of the link (their mutual relationship).