In this 4th industrial era, social media is one of the most accessed Internet service technology since it allows people to communicate and get various information. Nowadays, many entrepreneurs use social media to help them in running a business, while many scholars believe social media could generate individual’s intention to start a business with this digital assistance. However, the growth of social media users is not in line with the number of digital entrepreneur in Indonesia. The number of entrepreneurs itself especially in Bandung city is still small, whereas graduate students from university are expected to overcome this issue. Lack of entrepreneurs are because the low interest of the community to choose entrepreneur as a career, moreover as digital entrepreneur.
Therefore, the objective of this research was to measure prior knowledge (X1) and self-efficacy (X2) as independent variable, social media (X3) as moderator, and digital entrepreneurial intention (Y) as dependent variable. This research wants to find out the causal effect social media as moderating variable on individual’s intention to become a digital entrepreneur. Even though, digital entrepreneurial intention (DEI) is still rarely discussed among previous authors.
Data were distributed to 356 active final year students of Telkom University, Widyatama University, and Parahyangan Catholic University who enrolled in S1 business management program. The data collected through online questionnaire on social media (Instagram, Line, Whatsapp, and Twitter) by using google form. The 356 valid data were analyzed by using SEM analysis with Lisrel 8.70 software.
The result showed that self-efficacy had the highest score compare to other variables, that means students have a good self-efficacy on digital entrepreneurship. Social media also shown a very high score, while both digital entrepreneurial intention and prior-knowledge had high score. Based on the empirical result, it can be concluded that prior knowledge influence digital entrepreneurial intention where t-value greater than critical value (6.833>1.96) with the most positive significant effect, self-efficacy influence digital entrepreneurial intention (4.216>1.96), and self-efficacy were also influenced by prior knowledge (9.866>1.96). However, social media has a negative value on moderating prior knowledge (-3.052<-1.96) and self-efficacy (-0.953>-1.96) toward digital entrepreneurial intention.
Evidently, social media as a moderator on prior knowledge and self-efficacy give a negative affect toward digital entrepreneurial intention. Social media as external learning tool may not influence one to have an intention in becoming a digital entrepreneur. As in descriptive result, this research suggested Bandung private universities and entrepreneurship communities to maximize the existence potential of undergraduate college students for entrepreneurship world, since the level of self-efficacy, prior-knowledge, and digital entrepreneurial intention among these students are high.