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TopIn the offline retailing world, direct contact with a salesperson provides the customer with important cues for the establishment of trust (i.e., eye contact and gestures) which enhance the relationship and intentions to buy (Steinbrück et al., 2002). In contrast, the Internet lacks these kinds of human aspects, limiting the potential of purely virtual businesses (Anderson et al., 2010). To enhance this capacity, e-commerce companies must deploy mechanisms which enable two-way interactions between customers and e-retailers. This involves embedding social-media cues (i.e., cues based on human characteristics) into website interfaces via different communication media (Wang & Emurians, 2005). Today, new media tools like weblogs, instant messaging platforms, video conferencing, and online social-networks are reengineering the way people interact and are unleashing the potential of businesses worldwide (Hawn, 2009; Reding, 2010). Face-to-face communication is being replaced by synchronous and asynchronous communication such as e-mail, texting, blogging, podcasting, instant messaging and mobile devices (Badawy, 2009). The integration of such social-media cues into retail websites will increase the perception of employee presence and improve consumers’ online experiences (Wang et al., 2007). ‘Virtual advisors’, one particular form of website social-presence, may for instance facilitate customers to make a decision to purchase the right product (Dash & Saji, 2007).