Reference: Babar, A., Rasheed, A., & Sajjad, M. (2014). Factors Influencing Online Shopping Behavior of Consumers in Journal of Basic and Applied scientific research, 4(4), 314-320
Main idea: This article focuses on the TAM (technology acceptance model) which identifies and predicts the factors that motivate or demotivate a consumer in using technological devices.
Summary:
A new trend that has been the talk of the town for the past few years which has also faced great challenges yet proved to be effective and useful is online shopping, or e-shopping. Data was collected from 132 internet users. And the main variables that were taken into account came from the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). TAM has been previously used by researchers for identifying and predicting different factors that motivate or demotivate a customer in using any technology and also helps predict the reception level of any technology.
Four measures are focused in order to get a deeper understanding of how people view online shopping which are, usefulness, ease of use, financial risk, and attitude.
The rise of e-shopping and online shopping nowadays has given retailers and companies an advantage to stay available whenever the customers want and need them to be. One reason for the emergence of such a phenomenon is the innovations in technological devices such as tablets, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops which have all helped in accessing the internet at a more frequent level and serve as a tool for other purposes and not only to access the internet.
The research in this article studies the emerging trends of e-shopping in Pakistan and would be helpful for marketers in order to formulate and choose their digital strategies wisely. The results revolve around the TAM model and the four measures are explained and analyzed.
- Usefulness, is the convenience of the new technology and it is what the user assesses to form an opinion before actually using it.
- Ease of use is the “perception that the whole process of making an online purchase is user friendly and does not require special struggles”.
- Financial risk, is risk on the adoption process of any new technology and whether it is too expensive and requires a lot of money to be used online or not.
- Finally, attitude towards online shopping is the “liking or disliking a person shares towards e-shopping, and it will determine the future behavior of a consumer in making or not making a final purchase decision”.
What was relevant in the findings of this study is that, usefulness was found to be the noteworthy forecast of attitude towards online shopping. However, ease of use and financial risk did not have strong influence on attitude formation as compared to usefulness and ease of use.