1.1 Introduction
The purpose of this chapter is aim to provide a background information about online shopping market. This chapter includes the background of this research whith includes the definition of e-commerce, e-retailing and their relative merits; the current situation of online market, especially introduce the multi-channel retail retailing, that encompasses definition of multi-channel, challenges retailers might face and the great potential of this retail style.
1.2 Definition of E-Commerce
.McGoldrick(2002) defined ‘electronic shopping’ as a form of shopping in which some form of electronic communications technology is used at the offering, ordering and/or payment stage. E-commerce takes place between companies between companies and their customers, or between companies and public administrations, (Whiteley, 2000). While Koty(2006) said that:”E-commerce is the process of managing online financial transactions by individuals and companies.” Usually the key components of e-commerce are distinguished between electronic commerce between businesses (B2B), between consumers and businesses (B2C) and that between consumer each other. (McGoldrick, 2002; Timmers, 1999; Whiteley, 2000; Koty 2006). These definitions makes there are multiple perspectives to e-commerce and provide a comprehensive characterization of e-commerce (Holsapple and Sasidnaran, 2009). Holsapple and Singh (2000) provided a five-cluster taxonomy of E-commerce definitions, The five clusters are: the trading view, the information exchange view, the activity view, the effects view, and the value-chain view, also they advanced an integrated definition of E-commerce: (Holsapple and Singh, 2000, p164)
“Electronic commerce is an approach to achieving business goals in which technology for information exchange enables or facilitates execution of activities in and across value chains as well as supporting decision making that underlies those activities.”
These three key models of E-commerce B2B (e.g.: Cisco) is viewed as dealing with manufacturing and wholesale activity, and B2C (e.g.: Amazon) as dealing with retailing and service industry by The US Department of Commerce (2006), C2C e-commerce is consist of online customer auctions, (e.g.: eBay), with providing a platform for buyer and seller to engage in the selling and purchase of retail goods. Base on the total volume of E-commerce transaction in 2004 amounted to US$ 1951 billion which the biggest share is B2B segment, amounting to 93% or US$ 1821 billion, however B2C E-commerce remains perhaps the most visible and easily recognizable face of e-Commerce, ( Holsapple and Sasidnaran, 2009); C2C is still considered to be a fresher and the size of C2C accounts for only a piece of whole E-commerce market, according to industry analysts, In the U.S., consumer online auction sales will reach $65 billion by 2010, accounting for nearly one-fifth of all online retail sales (Forrester Research, 2005), the potential of C2C E-commerce should not be overlooked.
1.3. Definition of e-retailing
Due to this research aim The business of e-retailing has been defined as the sale of goods and services via internet or other electronic channels, for personal or household use by consumers, (Harris and Dennis, 2002). This definition includes all e-commerce activities that result in transactions with end consumers rather than business customers, in another word e-retailing is synonymous with business-to-consumer (B2C) transaction, retailing is synonymous with business-to-consumer (B2C) transaction, it is an activity undertaken by consumers to access retailers’ websites and this may or may not lead to the final purchase of product and services. (Dennis et al. 2004; McCormick, 2009)
1.4 The advantages and disadvantages of E-retailing.
1.4.1 Advantage of E-retailing
First of all, for retail companies in term of location is the most important. The E-commerce, can sell to anywhere in the country even oversea country, location is not as significant as physical retail store. Second, not only big size retailer can take a place in market, in E-commerce small and medium enterprises can compete on equal terms to large ones, it allows them respond to challenges and opportunities by reaching a large audience than high street and can be open 24 hours a day. (Dennis et al. 2004; Gutowska et al. 2009; White, 2000) E-commerce not only increases opportunities for the seller, but also increases purchasing opportunities for the buyer, they can consider a lot of different products and services form a wide range of choices which is broader than conventional commerce. (Schneider, 2004; Levy and Weitz, 2007)
1.4.2 Disadvantage of E-retailing
In other hands, E-commerce has limitation that not all of business can lend themselves to electronic commerce, for example perishable foods and high-cost, unique items, such as antiques, but in the future technologies might be devised.(Schneider, 2004) If retailers want to set up an e-retailing channel, there must have some understandable disadvantages and problems. First, retailer is required a substantial investment for technical know-how. However set-up costs are only the beginning; in order to provide a comprehensive capability the ongoing cost is much more than setting up new sites. Furthermore a continuous cost will be fulfillment and logistics; Legal problems must be considered, if retailer and consumer are not in the same countries, may be the conflict between law and taxation will come up; another disadvantage is that costumers tend to impulse purchases when they have touch, feel or smell the products, which e-selling can not provide. In addition, consumers have a perception that they are more willing to pay less money for the products as same as in-store. Finally, for oversea customers, the after-sell service could be difficult. (Dennis et al. 2004; White, 2000)
1.5. The value of online shopping market.
The Internet has been developing for three decades eventually during the mid-nineties, the commercial use of the internet triggered high expectations in both executives and investors. (Brache and Webb, 2000; White, 2000; Senn, 2000) Online shopping is broadly defined as an activity that includes finding online retailers and products, searching for product information, selecting payment options and communicating with other consumers and retailer as well as purchasing products or services. Therefore, online shopping is one of the most important online activities. It has also made significant contributions to the economy. (Cai,Y. and Cube, B.J. 2008) according to Verdict (2007), In 2006 online spending grew by 33.4% to £10.9bn and it predicts that in the UK online spending will reach £28.0bn in 2011.Even in the time of recession, for instance, in the UK, online shopping volumes are continuing with double-digit growth (IMRG,2008), whereas the performance of traditional shopping is unsatisfactory. It has a wide range of retail products such as clothing, clothing accessories, electronic devices, electrical appliances, computer hardware and software, books and magazines, food and beverages, health and personal care items, sporting goods, music and videos, and office equipment and supplies (Holsapple and Sasidnaran, 2009) The scale and growth of internet shopping is impressive. In 2005, the most recent year for which reliable figures are available, sales to households were over £21bn – a fourfold increase during in the last three years. There are millions of people and thousands of businesses getting benefits. Over 20 million UK adults shopped online in 2005, with 56 per cent of internet shoppers participate in the survey having spent over £500 each during the year. In the same year, an estimated 62,000 UK businesses were selling online to households. (OFT, 2007)
1.6. The multi-channel retailing.
1.6.1 Definition
Consumers today have many categories of shopping choice, they can choose one of category for themselves which is they like and suit for them. In order to fulfill customers purchase needs, retailers are aware of the increasing importance of offering an alternative ways for them, adopting multichannel retail strategy. (Nicholson et al. 2002; Pellegrini, 2005)The term multichannel retailing is relatively new strategy of retail marketing, generally, the first meaning of multichannel retailing is probably considered to be that a retailer offers goods through both a physical stores and the internet retail, the so called approach. (Pellegrini, 2005) This is not a comprehensive definition, Pellegrini (2005) mentions it can be extended in tow ways, it could be a retailer using all of channels, both physical (different store formats) and virtual (TV, the internet, catalogues) otherwise, it could be summarized as respect to the retail environment and the choice of channels open to consumers, without making reference to a specific retail company. Thus Pellegrini (2005) defined multichannel retailing as a retail environment that allows consumers to purchase the same good or category of goods in different store formats providing differentiated services. However, Duffy (2004) claim that the online component of multi-channel is critical to the success of the overall effort and it is becoming more powerful, sophisticated and measurable. When discussing multi-channel in this research is referring to online retailing and retailing from physical shop.
1.6.2 Challenges for multi-channel retailing
Thus, retail business face a huge challenge with a potential impact not encountered since the industrial revolution – surviving in a business model that includes the Internet. There are several reasons of traditional retailers are paying more attention on their electronic channel and evolving into multichannel retailers. First it overcomes the limitation of primary existing retail format, retailers can expand spaces which make more merchandise can be displayed and more assortment can be offered, provide more detailed information of products; second, retailer can reach out to new market and expand customer base through electronic channel; third when customers visit website of retailer, over forty percent of these customers tend to make purchase in retailer’s physical store, this is to some extent stimulate the growth of sales; fourth, an electronic channel can help retailer gain valuable information about how and why customers shop and are satisfied or not, meanwhile get a better understanding of consumers’ shopping behaviour, (Levy, M. and Weitz, B. A., 2007) In a word retailers has saw its great potential then adopted marketing strategy.
Some retailers which are going to move into multi-channel simply assume that ‘more is better’ and extend to internet would attract new customers and make profits upward; or they think their business could be easily adapted to multi-channel marketing environment. Multi-channel retailing is a business approach, a strategic process to retain a strong brand from channel to channel in a highly competitive market. Actually, there are still many challenges when retailers move into multi-channel, because the internet requires a high up-front investment in order to build an effective web presence to compete with exist ones. After the Internet established, retailers face the risk that this huge investment channel may cannibalize existing sales rather than serve as an opportunity for new customer acquisition, further decreasing profitability after a short run. A big problem for a new multi-channel retailer is delivery, on average, a flow of outbound shipments averaging 1.8 items per order is required for online sales to addresses all over the country, and consequently a comprehensive delivering line is necessary. (Gordon and Schoenbachler, 2002)
However, when businesses moving into the multi-channel, how to improve the channel has been a focus, another issue the multi-channel should face I how to drive customer to the channel with out offending other channel members.( Gordon and Schoenbachler, 2002) In fact, multi-channel marketing focus on the consumer contact rather than channel likely success, (Langford and Cosenza, 2000) multi-channel approach can be seen as a customer-centric approach that help companies to know how consumer interact with business.(Haydock, 2000)
1.6.3 Potential of multichannel
Customers are more sophisticated in their use of different channels, if technology makes multi-channel possible, the evolution of multi-channel is driven by consumer.(Verhoef and Donkers, 2005) There is a chance to increase consumer expenditure and increase financial performance if the firm applies multi-channel strategy, Myers, Pickersgill and Metre (2004) found that multi-channel consumer spend more 20%- 30% than general consumer, moreover, the consumers with higher purchase frequency and spending levels (heavy users) likely prefer shopping through multiple channels. (Venkatesan et al., 2007) due to they purchase more, they have greater familiarity with company, Kumar and Venkatesan (2005) considered that multi-channel customers are more valuable, make channels retailer used are more effectively. Meanwhile, the multi-channel retailing provides a greater convenience and opportunities for retailers to interact with consumers; Ribbink et al (2004) found that this multi-channel strategy makes more value for the customer and help company to achieve higher goals. Through Brand loyalty to retain customers is the key point for consumer e-loyalty and retailers recognize.
Payne and Frow (2005) and Boulding, Staelin, Ehret and Johnston (2005) carried out research concerning customer relationship management, emphasising that the key point to multi-channel retailing is to create a strategy that adds more value for the customer, enabling the firm to achieve better results. Much research has been carried out regarding consumer e-loyalty and retailers recognise the importance of retaining customers through brand loyalty. (Srinivasan, Anderson and Ponnavolu, 2002; Ribbink, Riel, Liljander and Streukens, 2004; Reibstein, 2002)
Integrated multi-channel retailing is a business approach, a strategicprocess to retain a strong brand from channel to channel in a highly competitive market
Cheng, J. M. S., Tsao, S. M., Tsai, W. H., and Tu, H. H. (2007) “Will e-Channel
Additions Increase the Financial Performance of the Firm: The Evidence from
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Ribbink, D., Riel, A., Liljander, V. and Streukens, S. (2004) ‘Comfort your online customer: quality, trust, and loyalty on the internet’, Managing Service Quality, Vol.14, No.6, pp 446-56.
1.7. Summary
Due to the development of online shopping and the great potential of multichannel, the future of online market is bright which lead to study of online shopper behaviour has become more and more important. It does not only help marketer make effective strategies, but also assist online shopping market further development. According to the literature review the online consumer behaviour is a relatively new area; there are several differences from traditional consumers. The research is aim to investigate how the online environment affect online consumer behaviour, the next chapter will review the literature associate with e-shopper buying behaviour to provide the initial understanding of consumer behaviour in the online shopping context.
2.1 Introduction
With the increase of online shopping and application of multi-channel, the study of e-consumer behaviour is increasingly crucial for retailer (Dennis et al., 2004). In the research of Dennis et al. (2009), consumer behaviour is divided into two orientations, consumer orientation which includes shopping orientation, motivation for e-shopping, perceptions of risks and benefits, demographics of consumer and psychological characteristics. Another is technology orientation; it means the technical specifications of an online store, refers to interface, design and navigation, payment, information, intention to us and ease of use. In early research, e-consumers were different from the typical traditional shopper. Brown et al. (2003) status that e-shoppers tend to pay attention on functional and utilitarian, they are younger than average and more be male, usually have higher education level and social status. However, in recent research, Jayawardhena et al. (2007) get an opposite result that indicate the consumer behaviour in both traditional market and online market are very similar, there are non-functional motives for e-consumer about recreational and psychological gratification(Parsons, 2002) and it reflects in social networking sites and e-word of mouth. (Dennis et al. 2009)
Accordingly in this chapter e-consumer behaviour literature review will be executed from these two aspects. Orientation of consumer behaviour research and make an initial analyzing changes of e-shopper behaviour from past to now.
2.2 Characteristics of e-shopper
With the development of technology, the characteristics of consumers are changing gradually. The advent of online shopping gave retailers one more way to classify consumer with similarities and provide apparent differences from earlier shoppers. (Dennis et al., 2004) Donthu and Garcia (1999) characterized e-shoppers as following:
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- More innovative in their shopping activities;
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- Convenience oriented;
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- More impulsive in purchases;
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- Less brand conscious;
- Less price conscious.
However, over one decade there are more or less changes in characteristics of consumer. Due to they are more innovative, the World Wide Web which is restricted by desktop or laptop is not the end of e-retailing. Nowadays the technology allows e-consumer to purchase through mobile and use e-retailing anywhere. They share the characteristics of earlier e-shoppers in that they are likely to be innovative consumers and impulsive in their purchases as they looking for shopping convenience. (Fenech, 2002)
The differences are that one is consumers in current e-retail marketing are inclined choose products and services from a well-branded retailer internet channel; this is the reason some successful retailers are also successful in online marketing. (Dennis et al. 2004) Because shopper loyalty in-store and online are linked, (Kimber, 2001) such as Tesco have a positive image in both in-store and online, it get 20 per cent more on average through online shopping channel, and become a leader of UK grocery market. (Dennis et al. 2004) Due to the security concern, online consumers prefer to shop form their recognized retailers. (Bourlakis et al. 2008)
Another one, the internet application increase consumer price sensitivity, e-shopper can easily make a price comparison from different retailers. Koyuncu and Bhattacharya (2004) indicated consumers are inclined to increase their shopping from the internet since online sopping provides better prices. The rise of online action also makes consumers dictate price. For example, Ebay is an online auction company which obtains growth in popularity with thousands of buyers and seller bidding daily.
2.3 Motivations for e-shopping.
consumer acceptance of online shopping has attracted widespread attention, Benjamin an Wigand (1995) claimed when first time the internet as a shopping medium to offer consumer service, it was considered as the most appropriate for consumer utilitarian needs. This functional aspect for shopping motivation refers to convenience, price and product range/access (Parsons, 2002, Rohm and Swaminathan, 2004) For example, one model of Bakos (1997) research demonstrated that the reduction of search cost may “destabilize a monopolistic equilibrium and eradicate sellers’ profits” This search cost encompasses both time cost and price cost. Accordingly, people who shop online are considered as time-poor that restrict them to do regular shopping and they would like to spend their non-work time in more recreational pursuits. (Parson, 2002)
There are two dimensions to consist of motivations to engage in retail shopping, utilitarian and hedonic. No exception in online shopping, although social and pleasure motivations are important for physical shopping, exclusive of some qualification, they are important for e-shopping as well.(Parsons,2002; Babin and Attaway,2000 ) Similarly, Childers et al. (2001) found that the attitude to internet shopping was strongly affected by enjoyment. On one hand, non-functional motivations attract customer into Website, and also enhance the value of functional attributes, thereby build a series of sustainable competitive advantages.(Parsons,2002)More recent researches reflect the functional benefits are no longer engage online buying; actually e-consumers increasingly tend to enjoy hedonic attributes online. (Bridges and Florsheim, 2008) Thus, customers who has positive attitude about one web site are more satisfied and more likely to make purchase. In one word, hedonic benefits and utilitarian benefits both have positive relationships with online stores attributes. (Childers et al. 2001; Shang et al. 2005)
2.4 The perceived risk of online shopping
Consumers usually feel worry or risk when making a purchase, and the general results from related studies indicate that consumers who are online shoppers have a higher level risk than purchase in store. (Samadi and Yaghoob-Nejadi, 2009) Perceived risk is a function of the uncertainty when making a purchase that may have unpleasant outcomes, (Forsythe and Shi, 2003) which strongly affect consumer behaviour, because people do not want to make mistakes. (Mitchell, 1999) a significant risk might lead to avoid or abandon the purchase activity.
The level of a perceived risk depends on many factors; Fenech (cited in Dennis, 2004) status that risk is a multi-dimensional construct for online shopping. In most cases perceived risks are divided into 6 types. These are the financial risk, which means possible monetary loss to a consumer; the product performance risk, it refers the loss incurred when a product or a brand performing less than expected; the social risk, it is defined as consumers’ assumptions from other people’s attitudes whilst shopping; the psychological risk, it means the possibility of customer discomfort about the purchase, such as disappointment, frustration; the physical risk often refers to the use of senses, like touch and smell; and the time/convenience risk, that means loss of time and inconvenience occurred because of difficulty of navigation and/or submitting orders, or delays of receiving merchandise, or faulty return policy. (Vijayasarathy and Jones, 2000; Forsythe and Shi, 2003; Featherman and Pavlon, 2003, Bourlakis et al. 2008) meanwhile, research also indicated that financial, time/convenience and privacy issues are the most important concerns influence the use of e-shopping. (Vijayasarathy and Jones, 2000; Featherman and Pavlou, 2003)
In order to diminish these risks, building trust has become a precondition for encouraging and nurturing online shopping. To some extent, the increasing use of internet can diminish financial risk, and experienced online buyers perceive less financial risks than inexperienced ones, furthermore, men perceive financial risks less significant than women. (Forsythe and Shi, 2003) There are many key issues affect consumer trust in internet shopping, for instance, credit card assurance policies, product warranty policies, policy on returned products, availability of escrow service, and ability o fuser friendly, reliable, efficient web navigation and animated shopping environment. (Lee and Turan, 2001,)
2.5 Demographic characteristics of e-consumer.
Emotion and trust are the tow dominant variables of online consumer shopping behaviour, but Girard et al. (2003) believed that demographics determinants, such as internet usage ,age, gender, education, income and employment status have critical role to play. Understanding the effects of these determinants can help e-retailers to make effective strategies. (Xu, 2008) Brown et al (cited in Bourlakis et al. 2008) research reported that the differences between demographic groups in the UK are gradually degressive which are reflect in the special demographic groups are catching up, such as older people and lower socioeconomic groups. However, in some research, not all the demographic elements have a positive relationship with e-shopping, maybe just because these variables result in other deeper structure variables. (Chang et al., 2005)
2.5.1 Internet usage
The usage of internet positively affects the consumers’ attitude towards online shopping, predicts online shopping intention and influences the frequency of e-shopping. (Chang et al. 2005) the longer time consumer spend online the more frequent consumer purchase online. (Jayawardhena et al., 2007) besides the characteristics that are younger, higher income, and better educated, online shoppers have more ‘computer literacy’ (Swinyard and Smith, 2003; Allred et al. 2006) Kim and Park (2005) found that when people search information form one channel, they also tend to make purchase through the same channel.
2.5.2 Age
In contrast, younger consumer tent to seek alternatives, younger men are regarded as the early adopter of online shopping, they have positive attitude to such a new shopping channel (Korgaonkar, 1999) younger customers likely to purchase online than older consumers, many researches argue that most e-consumers are young men with more knowledge about the internet; also they have better education and higher incomes. (Brown et al. 2003; Vijayasarathy, 2003 and Swinyard, 2003)
2.5.3Gender
In fact, the effects of gender about online shopping is multifarious, the first adopters of e-shopping are male consumer. (Jayawardhena et al., 2007) Nowadays, more and more women are shopping online that lead to the gap between the effects of gender element becoming narrow, (Colley and Maltby 2008) However, the gap is still exist, differences are reflected in (1) attitude towards online shopping; (2) online shopping motivation; (3) online information research and (4) their online purchase intention. (Xu, 2008) Ha and Stoel’s (2004) found that females likely to be more innovative and use the internet more frequently for searching information about apparel product than male consumers. Also the level of perceiving fun, females are higher than males. This helps retailers improve the efficiency of marketing strategies such as target females with non-price promotional offers. (Carpenter and Moor, 2008)
2.5.4Education
Education has significant and positive relationship with the time spent for information of products and services, (Joines et al. 2003) people who has higher level of education tend to pay attention on prior gathering and processing information then making decision, moreover, when dealing with new information, better educated consumer feel more comfortable.(Homburg and Giering, 2001) Because, the level of education may influence occupation and income, disadvantages in education result shortcoming in occupation and income, then difficult in paying the internet fee. (Wasserman and Richmond-Abbott, 2005)
2.5.5 Income and Employment status
Similarly, many studies emphasized there is positive relationship between income and online shopping, due to the time saving and convenience characteristics of e-shopping, people who have higher income level likely to have higher intention to purchase online, Allred et al. (2006) also noted that e-shoppers are wealthier. The reason may be that most consumers who have full-time work tend to have more income than part time ones, therefore they usually feel greater time pressure for shopping, and furthermore they are attracted by fast delivery, opening times and low prices (Dholakia, 1999; Vrechopoulos et al., 2001)
About employment status, Xu and Paulins (2005) found that students’ attitudes about e-shopping for apparel products are affected by employment status, they indicated that compared with non employed students, students who have employment either full time or part time, have limited free time, may experience more time pressures, thus employed students choose online shopping in their working counterparts than in their leisure time.
2.7 The web experience
Constantinides (2004) gave a comprehensive literature review which concluded the main factors influence e-consumer behaviour, these factors are divided into two categories, consumer characteristics and environmental influences are controllable factors and product/ service characteristics, medium charateristics and merchant/intermediary characteristics are unctrollable factors. Retailers make the consumers perceive ease of use and usefulness of website through controlling these elements. Usually the elements may refer to security features of sites, website layout and linkages to other websites (O’ Cass, and Fenech 2003) which are relevant with technical specification of an online store.
However, many online companies still struggle with understanding their target consumer and do not know how to driving online channel (Jonies et al., 2003)
Kotler (2003) noted that the consumer buying process occurs in sequence from learning to decision making, and each step reflects the degree of consumers involvement purchasing. Also marketers can influence the consumer behaviour and final outcomes of interaction between seller and consumer through engaging different marketing tools which are known as marketing mix, such as products, price, and promotion. (Kolter and Amstrong, 2001) In the online shopping context, experience and enjoyment build up “e-interactivity” which includes visual merchandising and the impact of all senses on consumer behaviour. (Dennis et al., 2009) Kotler (2003) has added the web experience into the traditional buying behaviour frameworks. A result is showed from some of academic and practitioners have realized “online shopping experience” or “virtual experience” is one of important marketing issues. (Constantinides, 2004)
Web experience is much more complicated than physical shopping experience, because the consumer is not only a shopper but also the user of information technology. (Cho and Park, 2001) marketers directly control online marketing tools to affect buying behaviour of virtual consumer, and resulting the total impression of consumer towards online retailer named web experience. Such as searching, browsing, finding, selecting, comparing, evaluation information as well as interaction and transaction with the online company are all facets of web experience. (Constantinides, 2004) Constantinides (2004) also noted there are several elements aim to influence customers’ attitudes and final outcome of online interaction by affecting their total impression and actions, that are design, events, emotions, and atmosphere as well as other elements experienced during interaction.
The web experience is crucial parameter for pure e-retailer as well as multi-channel firms, an interior quality of web experience does not only influence the internet sale but also damage the physical store profit.(Constantinides, 2004)If a multi-channel retailer provides superior web experience can strongly effects their store customers’ attitudes and perceptions, thus driving more traffic to increase sales. According to Nua Internet survey (2002) which showed that 60 percent clients who have a negative shopping experience either online shopping or store shopping tend to change opinions and select another brands to purchase, and also underline web experience has positive effects on traditional channel. Therefore, besides basically meet customers’ product needs and expectations, a superb web experience is also designed follow the steps of their buying process.(Constantinides, 2004)
2.8 Summary
This chapter reviewed the e-consumer behaviour theories form the synthesis of three different aspects, the e-shopper buying behaviour can be differentiated by consumer orientation and technology orientation, by utilitarian and hedonic motivations and by factors which can be controlled by marketers. To link with the research topic, then suggests that investigations to explore and analysis online selling environment that affects consumer behaviour is crucial. The following chapter will review the literature of online environment affecting online shopping behaviour in detail to further support research progressing.
3.1. Introduction
Customer acquisition and retention are strongly affected by effective retail environment, McGoldrick (2002) noted that store selling environment is the key to decide that whether shopping experience is convenient and attractive, it has been using as a powerful weapon to differentiate brand image, retailers realize that they are in an “experience” economy, even no exception with electronic shopping. Ribbink et al. (2004) discussed that the awareness and image built for online store can be transferred to brick and mortar stores. Compare with traditional store design, the scope of online store design is greater because it has to cover almost everything that should be covered by interaction with salesperson only through computer screen; furthermore, such customer service and after-sales services also have to be incorporated into the design. (Dennis, 2004) For the purpose of achieving a consistent customer experience, website design is used to convey the appropriate mix of beauty and functionality. This chapter will detail review e-store design for online environment base on online fashion environment model which given by McCormick and Vazques (2009), especially investigate consumer’ perception of the online environment.
3.2 website design
e-store design is usually refers to e-store website design, McCormic(2009) noted that due to the attributes of the internet, which is a service and information medium and used as a marketing tool, the whole online environment is visble, accessible and available to consumer. McCormic believed that ease of use, visual appearance, information quality and interactivity are considerations of online environment building up. This is relevant with an integrated framework for e-store design provided by Dennis (2004), Navigability, Web atmospherics and interactivity are the components of website design, Dennis discussed that navigability and interactivity are the technical components that navigability as the fundamental block of e-store design and progress to interactivity, and web atmosphere has similarity with traditional store environment. McCormick and Vazquez (2009) gave a comprehensive model of online fashion environment, shows in Figure. 1. The following literature review will carry out in turn base on this framework.
3.3. Navigability
Navigability seems as the most fundamental element of website design, which allows consumers are able to browse around the site easily and efficiently. (Dennis, 2004) most of online shoppers take web navigation to be a key driver of online shopping due to the time compression, they mainly concern about finding correct product efficiently and purchasing in a short time. Balasubramanian et al (2003) believed that a well designed website and easy navigation can easily create website satisfaction. In physical store customer navigate product through store layout which designed in one or more types, this is also applied for online shopping environment, Ha et al (2007) addressed this problem by setting product departments and merchandise directories to online merchandising categories like setting in offline store. Likewise, due to the touch and smell limitations of online shopping when product presenting, (White, 2000) the design has to create a similar experience like in traditional store as much as possible to cut down consumer perceived risk
3.3.1. Search classification
3.3.2. Interactive viewing
3.4. Online Atmospherics
There are many studies noted that online atmospherics are similar with physical selling environment. (Childers et al. 2001)
4 Methodology
leads to the analysis of the Internet shopping determinants and motivations becoming increasingly crucial, and increases the requirement to analyse and conceptualise online consumers’ shopping behaviour to facilitate individual e-retailers in setting effective marketing strategy/strategies, and also further to assist online shopping market development in a direction of fast and yet stable profit growing. The next chapter will evaluate and analyse consumer behaviour theory literature to provide the fundamental concepts for understanding consumer behaviour theory in the international online shopping context. Chapter 4 will provide an analysis of the literature and detailed evaluations of online shopping determinants, motivations, information search and purchase decisions in online shopping. The combination of chapter 3 and chapter 4, will provide the essential elements acting as a basis for online shopping behaviour new framework development and aid conceptualisation and evaluation of online shopping behaviour theory.
Analysing, and The next chapter will review the literature associated with the online shopping market, Chapter 3 will review the literature associated with consumer behaviour models; Chapter 4 will review literature related the variables affecting online shopping behaviour
Sites delivering superb Web experience are designed in a way not only addressing the client’s product needs and expectations but also assisting the customers through the steps of the buying process that many online firms still do not completely understand the needs and behavior of the online consumer (Lee, 2002) while many of them “. . . continue to struggle with how effectively to market and sell products online” (Joines et al., 2003, p. 93
Thesis reference
McCormic, H. (2009) Analysing and Conceptualising the Online Fashion ShoppinG Environment
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Constantinides, E. (2004), ‘Influencing the online consumer behavior: the web experience’, Internet research, Vol.14, No.2, pp 111-126
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Retail & Distribution ManagementVolume: 30 Issue: 10 Page: 459 – 469
The study of Consumer behaviour can provide a series of significant information to the marketer about how the consumer behaves before, during and after purchase. It clearly identifies the factors that influence marketer’s decision making process and tells marketer who are involved and how is the buying done. According to this understanding the marketer is going to design corresponding strategies and implement.
. For e.g. multiplexes know that people like to see movies on weekends and evenings and therefore, evening and weekend shows are priced higher than the morning and weekly noon shows. They also know that there is a crowd of people like college students who are highly price sensitive so to balance the traffic they adopt such strategies. The probability of success increases if a marketer knows his consumer well and has done proper research of his behaviour.
There is a widespread recognition that consumer behaviour is the key to contemporary marketing success (Hawkins et al., 2003).
Hawkins, Del I., Best, R. and Coney, K. (2003), Consumer Behaviour: Building Marketing Strategy. Boston, Massachusetts: Irwin McGraw-Hill
Consumer behaviour studies have been conducted in many countries of the world. In marketing, consumer behaviour has become the most important sub-field