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E-Commerce: Comparison of On-Line Shopping Trends, Patterns and Preferences Against A Selected Survey of Women by James Christopher November 2004
E-Commerce: Comparison of On-Line Shopping Trends, Patterns and Preferences Against A Selected Survey of Women by James Christopher November 2004
E-Commerce: Comparison of On-Line Shopping Trends, Patterns and Preferences Against A Selected Survey of Women by James Christopher November 2004
Abstract
With the explosion of the e-commerce in the past few years, distinct
buying patterns and preferences have emerged for specific groups
and other demographics. These patterns have been measured and
collected by numerous independent marketing, business and even
academic studies to understand how consumers connect with new
technology. With the advent of the Internet and its related
technologies as a new vehicle for commerce, new models have
developed. This paper lays the groundwork with brief introduction of
recent trends in e-commerce on people; particularly its impact on
women. This is followed by their general perceptions and preferences
of the online shopping including product and website selection. Each
of these e-commerce generalities will be compared to information
amassed from survey questions and open ended discussions with a
small sample group of women. It will also delve into favorable as
well as negative website characteristics and sum up the favorable
elements into a description of an e-commerce website that would
suitable to the group being studied.
James Christopher
Kingston University
Email: K0326965@kingston.ac.uk
ID: K0326965
MSC Business Information Technology Programme
Course: E-Commerce, John Eldred
Introduction
The Internets impact on people has been profound; particularly with respect to
consumers, who are starting to use the Internet as a new medium to trade and
purchase goods and services. In the early years of e-commerce, buying online was an
erudite activity strictly dominated by techies and semi-technology literate
individuals. These individuals were mostly made up of 20 to 35 year old males. This
demographic were more comfortable and in tune with Internets capabilities. But in
recent years, the numbers of females making the technology leap to shop online is
surging. Females are starting to harness Internet to make their lives easier and
efficient.
The recent surge has generated all of sorts of new data on womens online buying
trends, patterns and preferences.
1.1.
Objective
These new trends are analyzed against a survey of ten women in marketing field. The
volunteers of this survey will be collectively referred as the sample. Using the
answers harvested in the survey of questions, comparisons with other formal research
performed on similar demographics and some direct observation of sample members
browsing and making purchases online, this paper will correlate the samples view
online shopping against the formal research on current online buying patterns of
females. All of this data will culminate and modeled into theoretical, best-of-breed
e-tailer.
1.2.
Caveats
Since the sample group is too small and the pool of participants are not selected at
random, the paper makes only very generalized and tenuous conclusions about buying
patterns and perceptions of this particular demographic. The survey results are not
considered scientific or statistically dependable. Although some quantitative methods
may be introduced, it also does not make any use of quantitative analysis to help
support the conclusions of this document.
1.3.
The sample in the study was not selected at random; instead, the members met a
specific requirement. The sample used in this study involves a specific demographic.
First, all of the members of the sample group are female with the age ranging from 20
to 25 years old. Second, all members of the sample are full-time university students.
Lastly, all are enrolled in a marketing postgraduate or equivalent programme. There
were no restrictions in residency, ethnicity, nationality or financial status; therefore all
the members varied in demographic nuances.
Because of the education level and sophistication of the sample, there are several
assumptions made about the sample group in this study. It is assumed that all the
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1.4.
A set fifteen questions were prepared before interviews commenced. All the
questions pertained exclusively to the subject of online shopping. Prepared questions
in the survey mixed between closed-ended questions expecting succinct answers (see
Appendix Table 1) to open-ended questions, which required more elaboration of
sample members online experience and perceptions of electronic purchasing.
As a contingency to any complications in describing web concepts or confusion in
terminology, the prepared questions, reinforced by an open discussion with each
individual sample member on topics relating to the shopping, improved the
understanding, depth and clarity of the sample members online experience.
Since the surveys where performed face-to-face, the number of questions in the
survey were not fixed. This flexible approach meant that if a member volunteered
information that were within the scope of the subject matter contained in the question,
more questions could be raised to harvest more data.
There was no limitation on the where the survey was conducted. The surveys were
conducted primarily in participants lodging, but locations included public places as
well. Participants who preferred to have surveys conducted at their residence or
surveyors residence, had the opportunity to demonstrate how they navigate various
shopping sites and their thoughts about the site.
All the members of this survey reported to use email, chat and personalizing browsing
at least once a day. The question of frequency of online shopping needs to be clarified
and solidly defined. For instance, the respondents reported not shopping, meaning not
purchasing anything online on a weekly basis, but admitted to browsing products
online or window shopping online at least on a weekly basis. The activity of
browsing not only entailed visiting personal sites of general interest and information,
but included perusing sites of various online retailers, auctions and merchandise
intermediaries. If the definition of online shopping encompassed perusing
merchandise online, then the frequency rate of shopping dramatically is increased.
Instances where the respondent did not plan to purchase or did not anticipate making
an online purchase; the act of browsing and aggregating information about a certain
product of interest increased the likelihood of the respondents desire to acquire that
product and thus make an online transaction.
Strict definitions and semantics aside, what about users actually purchasing
merchandise through the Internet? A joint survey prepared by an Internet customer
service provider, PeopleSupport and market research firm, NUA measured that almost
two thirds of Internet users who shop more than once a week are women. (Cox, 2000)
Contrasting the high numbers cited PeopleSupport and NUA survey; all the members
of the sample group for this study did not shop as frequently as once a week. Most of
the members who have already bought something online reported buying items online
at least 3 weeks to 4 weeks to as long as 6 weeks. One member, who happened to be
one of the early online shoppers, shopped more frequently than the others. She
acknowledged that she purchased groceries online approximately every two weeks
from Tescos delivery service.
The sample groups frequency of buying something online is still higher than
consumers using print catalogs to buy products. For instance, Direct Marketing
Association estimated that catalog users purchase approximately four items
throughout the entire year. (2002) The sample group exceeded these estimates.
tended to do a lot more comparison shopping and are highly confident in finding
comparable, if not lower prices on similar products from direct sellers and store
vendors. When posed as to why they dont go and scout out those lower prices from
physical stores, the answer they gave almost unanimously was that they didnt have
time. Here is where the time issue intervenes because a lot of time would be required
to find those bargain prices from direct or vendors; therefore time saving trumped
price as a key reason among the sample members.
They psychology of groups and organizations are beyond the scope of this paper;
however, it is worth mentioning the power of peer influence as a reason for buying
online. Six of the respondents mentioned that they bought a product online simply
because it was suggested by a friend or an acquaintance to buy it online.
With the exception of peer influence, the reasons for buying online in this survey are
congruent with other independent studies of online buying behavior and patterns. For
instance, a joint study conducted by MSN and Millward Brown IntelliQuest found
that 60% of women believe the Internet is convenient and saves time. Price is not
mentioned. (Microsoft, 2001)
Other reason mentioned by the sample members include: no sales pressure from sales
people, the privacy associated with Internet shopping and product availability.
margin durable goods (i.e. laptops and fridge) online whilst only one of the
respondents referred to earlier purchased perishable goods (groceries) online.
Mobile telephones, either used or new were also mentioned as another popular item
bought online. Four respondents bought mobiles without contracts. One bought with a
contract attached to the purchase of the online. The practice of obtaining a mobile
online was more prevalent with members who have origin or long residencies in U.K.
or European states.
Amazon unsurprisingly, rank first and second respectively in the shopping sector. (See
Appendix, Table 2.) Another site, Rank.com further dissects the ranking, reporting
that Amazons and eBays multiple country domains like Amazon.de, eBay.co.uk and
Amazon.ca rank as the top visited websites globally. (Rank.com, 2004)
Information of popular website ranking reflects high publicity, high volume visitors,
new customers as well as repeat customers. This translates to continued growth for
these pure play businesses. So how does the data match up with the sample survey
group?
The data provided by various ranking websites harmonize with the respondents
identification of websites they consistently visit and shop. Almost unanimously, the
respondents identified Amazon as the site they have made at least one online purchase
on. Eight of the ten respondents in the sample survey identified eBay as another
primary shopping site.
Full service and regional travel booking websites such as Expedia, EasyJet, RyanAir
and Travelocity are also frequently visited by all the sample members largely because
most the members of the survey are frequent travelers. Even specific airlines such as
British Airways, Delta Airlines, and Singapore Airlines to name a few were mentioned
as sites visited.
Lesser known e-tailers visited by the survey group could not be recorded in this study
because most of the respondent either didnt remember either the name of the website
name or the URL. In some of the cases, the respondents accessed another web portal
to be directed to the site. Other cases, the member used a popular search engine to
find the specific product of interest.
from the discussion sorted by category about what a great e-commerce site should
have:
Product Variety: Amazons expansion into a variety of products other than books has
made the site a one stop shopping website. For the same reason, eBay presents a
variety of used and sometimes new products making it easy for the consumer from
jumping from site to site looking for the right product to get.
Site or Product Reputation & Specialty: There were a variety of sites reported by
the sample members that were selected based on the respondents personal interest or
purchasing an item from a site because of product reputation and can be acquired via
online (see Appendix C). For example, three of the ten respondents listed Dell as
another popular site for purchasing high margin goods, such as the respondents
working laptop. However, frequency of returning to Dell for other related electronic
products and peripherals are slim to none.
Customer Service and Support: This area was at the top of the list where the timing
of the delivery after making an online purchase and availability of customer support if
transaction or other miscellaneous problems occurred were the core needs in customer
service. So deliver the product fast and you make the consumer happy.
Based on the respondents requirements, customer support was an important feature to
e-tailers. But experiencing the effort to contact customer support was rare to all the
sample members since most of the transactions went problem free. This can be a
testament to the e-tailers investment in the quality of service.
Finding products should be easy. Respondents highlight ease of page navigation and
searching features as another important feature a website is required to have.
Navigating large, complex sites like eBay and Amazon would be painstakingly slow
and frustrating if consumers had to traverse multiple nested pages to locate the item of
interest.
Another area of improvement with the sample members was use of advertising. Lately
it has become a hot issue to all consumers over the past few years. The use of
intrusive advertising such as pop-ups and floating banners make visits to an annoying
experience.
The answers provided by the respondents closely matched conventions provided by
Webreference.com. As one of the premier web development reference sites for
professional web technologists and designers, it has provided guidelines that are
practical rules of thumb when creating sites. Two other characteristics that was
underscored as a reason for going online but not highlighted by the respondents were
good tracking and automation embedded in the site and security. E-tailers must make
transactions pain free and easy for both first time visitors and existing clientele. Also,
websites should have good security or at least the appearance of safety and privacy.
Consumers will hard press to never return if they are victims of the site that
compromised their credit information.
There currently no conventions on web page design in the industry. Various layout
formats, interactive features, and product display pervade multitudes of e-tailing home
pages making page navigation and user functionality difficult. Jakob Nielsen of
Nielsen Norman Group (NNG), a world renowned authority in web usability provides
rules to think when designing technology around and for people. Nielsen proposes
that a visitor or consumer visiting a site should feel intuitive, familiar and functional.
(see Appendix D)
Conclusion:
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Based on the information collected from this small sample study, all the best elements
of e-commerce, does not guarantee consumers will visit or remain loyal. But looking
at what they want and their satisfaction levels of other well established e-tailers such
as Amazon and eBay who have already invested significant resources to understand
what consumers needs, wants and desires. Perhaps it would be useful to emulate
these established pure players since they have been and continue to be highly
successful as retain high marks for customer satisfaction.
12
13
eBay
Amazon.com
Yahoo Auctions
Walmart
Target
Brand Strength
Company
Mind Share(1)
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
24.1%
16.1%
4.9%
2.7%
1.9%
1.8%
1.3%
1.1%
1.0%
0.9%
0.9%
Amazon.com (a)
eBay.com (a)
Yahoo.com (a)
priceline.com (a)
buy.com (a)(c)
Barnesandnoble.com
CDNow.com
AOL.com
Egghead.com (a)(c)
IWon.com
JCPenney.com
Share(2)
18.7%
15.8%
6.0%
3.9%
3.3%
3.1%
3.0%
2.7%
2.6%
2.3%
2.3%
(1) Mind Share = the percent of Internet users for whom the site
first came to mind when asked to think of Web sites that sell
products or services over the Internet
(2) Purchaser Share = the percent of online buyers that bought from
the site
14
64
40
38
36
28
27
26
25
22
16
15
16
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