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Perceived Benefits of Online Shopping : Scale Modification and Validation
Abstract
Use of the Internet has opened countless business opportunities, and online shopping is one of the most popular among all. Benefit perception towards online shopping is one of the major influencing factors towards consumer's online purchase decisions. Therefore, the current study aimed at exploration of the construct: perceived benefits of online shopping (PBOS). The study rigorously explored the past research studies though secondary literature review to develop the primary understanding of the construct, which was followed by modification of existing scales to propose a new scale to measure PBOS. Understanding of the construct PBOS through literature review was followed up through refinement, modification, and validation of a more relevant and contemporary scale to measure PBOS. The past and existing scales generally measured benefit and risk perception concurrently to capture the overall perception towards online shopping, while this study focused on measurement of PBOS independently to get a focused insight. A list of 39 items on PBOS from one of the past studies was further refined to get a modified scale with 21 items. These 21 items were further used in two distinctive studies with different samples of sizes 350 and 650 collected during separate time periods through independent studies. EFA followed by CFA in two independent studies resulted in the development of a comprehensive 21 item scale measuring seven dimensions of PBOS.
... Considering the extensive role of benefit perception toward online shopping, it is considered as one of the major influencing factors toward consumer's online purchase decisions (Fülöp et al., 2023). Tomar et al. (2018) developed a 21-items scale-'perceived benefits of online shopping (PBOS)' to have a focussed insight of benefits independently rather than measuring benefit and risk perception concurrently. ...
... Online shopping, unlike physical shopping, offers shoppers multiple choices in terms of product category under one roof, which may not be the case even in a retail outlet (Tomar et al., 2018). This makes it a convenient modus of shopping, being accessible 24×7. ...
In the past two decades, the e-commerce industry has grown exponentially. With new customers being on board everyday, understanding customer behavior has become more relevant than ever before. Trust is a vital aspect in the online shopping experience as it significantly influences consumer behavior, including the selection of e-commerce brands. Thorough literature review has yielded three dimensions of online trust, that is, ability, benevolence, and integrity, but no literature was found on whether there could be any prioritization among the three dimensions. This study used confirmatory factor analysis to verify the predefined scale of dimensions of online trust and analytical hierarchy process (AHP) technique to prioritize and solve a problem that required the multi-criteria decision making. The seminal contribution of this paper is ranking the three dimensions of online trust as identified in literature. The results affirmed that ability is the top ranked dimension of online trust for e-commerce brands that drives online shoppers followed by benevolence and integrity. © 2021, Associated Management Consultants Pvt. Ltd.. All rights reserved.
Social couponing is a growing promotional phenomenon in the service industry. However, since the conversion rate of distributed coupons into coupons redeemed for purchase is relatively low, there is a need to understand the redemption decisions of consumers. Lower conversion rates lead businesses to lose both customers and profits. Previous studies have typically focused on social couponing from a business perspective, without exploring factors from the customer’s end. The current study explores the factors influencing customers’ decision to redeem coupons and highlights the interrelationships between the factors. Data were collected from 353 online customers on their redemption experiences during their food purchases. Structural equation modeling was performed to examine the significance of the factors and establish the predictability of customers’ redemption decisions. We then explored different machine learners to identify the best-fitting models for customers’ redemption decisions. Results showed that the prediction accuracy of the decision-tree-based models was the highest. These models delineate the role of influencers in various redemption aspects and validate the mediation effects of perceived risk, deal proneness, referral, and consumption frequency. The study also highlights future research areas in the social couponing domain.
Purpose
The objective of this paper is to investigate the role of perceived benefits, namely, price, convenience and product variety in formation of online shopping attitude. The paper also studies the impact of online shopping attitude on online shopping Intentions by the application of the theory of reasoned action
Design/methodology/approach
A self-administered and structured online survey was conducted targeting female online shoppers of four metropolitan cities of India. A sample of 508 online shoppers was considered in the online survey. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to evaluate the research constructs, validity and composite reliability. Structural Equation Modeling and path analysis was also used to examine the hypothesized relationships of the research model
Findings
The authors of the paper reveals that price benefit, convenience benefit and product variety benefit has a significant positive impact on online shopping attitude and there is a considerable positive relationship between online shopping attitude and online shopping intention among women in India. Product variety was found to be the most important perceived benefit for Indian women.
Research limitations/implications
The research sample included only women shoppers who indulge in online shopping. Future research is encouraged to emphasize on other groups and gender to identify with their online shopping attitudes. Another important limitation of the study is consequent from the geographical perspective of the present study; that is India. The findings are not necessarily applicable to the rest of the world. Therefore, reproduction of the current study in diverse countries would probably support and confirm its findings. Also, the present study is cross-sectional which does not demonstrate how attitudes of online shoppers may alter over time. The authors of the current study encourage future research to apply a longitudinal design to the study to understand the transforms in consumers’ attitudes towards online shopping over time. Finally, this study explained a general phenomena, thus future research can be directed towards particular websites which may present different results.
Practical implications
The study supports the significance of perceived benefits (price, convenience and variety) as keys drivers of attitudes toward online shopping among women in India Marketers should distinguish the way they indulge their customers based on their perceived benefits of online shopping. In developing countries like India, where consumers, especially women, are generally depicted as risk averse, online shopping attitude plays an important role in the success of e-tailers. Certainly, if online shopping would not attach meaningful value and benefits to consumers, they would have negative attitude towards the same. Additionally, the empirical research study demonstrates variety to be the most important benefit for Indian women, ecommerce retailers should focus on maximizing the same to enhance online purchase intention among women customers. Women empowerment being the agenda in India currently, online retailers’ managers can benefit from such conclusions for targeting this huge untapped market and for future e-marketing policies
Originality/value
This research paper is one of the very few endeavors that investigated online shopping attitudes in India. Prominently, it exposed the role of perceived benefits in online shopping attitude in India. Price is one of the most critical factor concerning Indian shoppers which is a part of the present study. National and international e-tailers preparing to develop and expand their operations to India have now important empirical verification concerned with the determinants of online shopping attitudes and behavior in India which shall aid in marketing strategy development and implementation.