Abstract: Encountered by the COVID-19, domestic firms have utilized enterprise information platforms as social media outlets to conduct epidemic prevention, information exchanges, organization coordination, work operations and so on. Enterprise social media (ESM) has demonstrated unique advantages and played a significant role in running organizational production and operation. However, a lower level of employee motivation and participation is a problem that has caused a reduced effect of ESM. The current studies have presented limited findings on such issues as what is the status quo of employee utilization, what motivates the utilization of ESM, and how public social media experience (PSME) exerts moderating effects on ESM, and empirical quantification analyses are expected. Based on the Utilization and Gratification Theory (UGT), the authors propose and verify a model on the relationships among the degree of ESM utilization, ESM utilization motivation and the degree of PSME through the structural equation modeling (SEM). The results demonstrate that information sharing and self-documentation are the two motives for employee ESM utilization; and positive moderating effects of the PSME on the relationships between information sharing and ESM utilization and between self-documentation and ESM utilization start to work unless the PSME is up to a middle or even a higher level. Moreover, the analysis through the Johnson-Neyman method presents quantitative outcomes, clarifying a significant range of the moderating effects of PSME on ESM utilization. The research is conducive to a better understanding of the working mechanism among ESM utilization, ESM utilization motivation and PSME, and provides domestic firms with necessary references for making decisions on information management.

Key words: COVID-19, enterprise social media (ESM), public social media, Utilization and Gratification Theory