Page 941 - MARSIUM'21 COMP OF PAPER

942 Teo & Dr Adaviah (2021)

consumer purchase intention: mediation effect of brand equity. Mersid and Sumeja focus on the impact of social media communication on
consumer purchase intention. This research would focus on the impact of e-WOM and brand equity on repurchase intention toward Herms
C Enterprise.

■ 3.0 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 RESEARCH DESIGN

Conclusive research design will be adopted in this study which including descriptive research. Descriptive research is procedures
and methods for describing certain characteristics of a group of individuals (Gill & Johnson, 2010). This method includes collecting data,
organizing, and summarizing data. The design gathers data and tests the hypothesis as well as answers the questions about the present state
of the research issue. The benefit of adopting this method in this study is that it can illustrate the influence of e-WOM and brand equity on
customers' repurchase intention in various ways.

Furthermore, this research would be focused on the quantitative research method as a set of questionnaire would be distributed to
respondents to answer. The questionnaire would be created using google form and distribute to Instagram customers of HERMS C Enterprise
in order to collect data from the users. As Covid-19 pandemic, the questionnaire would be distributed through social media platform, which
is Instagram.

3.2 POPULATION

The population is defined as the entirety of items or individuals who have common, specified characteristics and are relevant to the
study's findings (Denise F. Polit & Cheryl Tatano Beck, 2010). As the research background emphasizes social media users in Malaysia, a
population is a group of persons or aspects of interest that have knowledge obtained by the researcher. The followers on Instagram of HERMS
C Enterprise had reached 6000 followers. Therefore, the targeted population for this research is Herms C Enterprise's customers on Instagram
who have experience with HERMS in Malaysia.

3.3 SAMPLE

This research proposes to use sample-to-item ratio to determine the sample size for this research depending on the number of items.
A sample-to-item ratio of 5:1 should be the least number of respondents requested in the surveys (Suhr, 2016). Tabachnick and Fidell (2013)
presented a five-to-one ratio method for determining sample size requirement while considering the number of independent variables. The
sample size may be determined as below:

Independent Variables = (IV1 items × 5) + (IV2 item × 5) + (IV3 items × 5)
= (6 x 5) + (4 x 5) + (4 x 5)
= 30 + 20 + 20
= 70

Mediator Variable = (MV items x 5)
= (5 x 5)
= 25

Dependent Variable = (DV items x 5)
= (3 x 5)
= 15

Minimum number of respondents = 70 + 25 + 15
= 110 respondents

3.4 SAMPLING TECHNIQUE

This study used convenience sampling, which involves the targeted population of Instagram users who meet the required criteria,
such as availability at a specific time or willingness to participate, in the study. The sample must be characterized by the fact that it accurately
represents the population due to the sample's data is used to generalize or draw conclusions about the population (Lau, Phang, & Zainudin,
2012). This study adopts convenience sampling approach because it is easy to identify respondents' repurchase intention impacted by
Instagram e-WOM and brand equity of HERMS C Enterprise. It is affordable, accessible and the subjects are readily accessible (Ilker Etikan,
Sulaiman Abubakar Musa, Rukayya Sunusi Alkassim, 2016).

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