Impact of Consumer Decision-Making On E-commerce Assignment Sample

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Impact of Consumer Decision-Making On E-commerce

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Introduction

Consumer behaviour is characterised as a study of how individual, organisation, or group of people to choose, purchase, use, and dispose of products and services offered by an organisation. Consumers want to purchase or avail services in order to satisfy their needs and wants. Before e-commerce businesses develop their marketing strategies, they are required to understand what factors can affect consumer decision-making and how they can decide on purchasing a particular material in order to accomplish their needs and wants. Buyers are instigated by a set of complex, subtle, and deep emotions. In many kinds of literature, it has been mentioned that consumer behaviour is the study of why, how, and where customer do or do not purchase a product. Consumer decision-making is the combination of many elements, such as economics, sociology, social anthropology, psychology, etc. In this research proposal, the statement of the problem will be provided, wherein the importance of the topic will be elaborated and the need for conducting the following investigation will also be highlighted. Furthermore, the document will also mention the purpose of the study in which the anticipated benefits and outcomes of the study to different stakeholders, such as researchers, societies, and organisations will be discussed. In addition to this, the following write-up will also outline the research questions and research hypothesis.

Statement of the Problem

The following research will be emphasising the problem-"Impact of Consumer Decision-Making on E-commerce- A Case of Amazon”. The study will aim at understanding the appropriate factors that impact the decision making of the consumers while ordering a product from the online retailer. In today's day and age, a new threat is emerging for the traditional enterprises has arrived and established rapidly which operates from an online platform (Ashman, et.al, 2015). The modern world is revolving around commerce which is being operated from both offline and online modes. Consumers have ever-changing demands and currently, the majority of them seek doorstep delivery. As the customers are termed as the real boss of the business, it is important to determine customer's expectation and their needs, wants, and preferences. Without determining what consumer exactly want, no firm can survive. The customers are required to serve the organisation some feedback. The information can help the organisation to understand consumer attitudes, competition, consumer attitude, opinions, and company's position. The e-commerce market is full of potential. With the rising influence of the Internet and time shortage in the life of people, the e-commerce industry is thriving as an emerging consumption mode. Online shopping has turned out to be the fastest-growing Internet activity as nearly 50% of Internet users do online shopping. It has been noticed that online shoppers are less brand loyal and more price conscious than traditional shoppers. Traditional consumers consider brand and price as signs of quality. E-commerce furnishes customers with more reliable and detailed information about the product and quality of information (Professional Academy, 2015). Seeing the potential of online trading, an organisation like Amazon has started trading a wide range of products through its online retailing platforms. Products, such as books, grocery, computer, electronics, travel, online money transaction, clothing, music, flowers, and many more are being sold online. Consumer decision-making depends on various processes. Nowadays, almost every organisation in the field of There is an involvement of different factors that affect the final decision-making of the customers. In the initial phase, the client tries to determine what he/she needs and based on that the selection of the products is made. The decision-making process is dependent on cultural, social, personal, and psychological factors. One factor can outclass other factor and can alter consumer behaviour.

Consumer behaviour is a very complicated process but it is prerequisite. A firm's ability to develop a warm relationship with the customers and develop a level of satisfaction depends on buying behaviour. Thus, buying behaviour more of a decision process and depends on the people involved in the process of purchasing goods and services. Different experts have given their views on consumer behaviour that are quite varying (Shiau and Luo, 2012). Some believe that in e-commerce, it is important that a company delivers the right product to the appropriate person. Even though e-retailers provide a large amount of data about a product to the customers, they are some chances of miscommunication that can be dreadful for the company's reputation. If the consumer does not get convinced by the information provided by the company, then there are high chances of sales getting reduced. Apart from this, many customers do not have much interest in the amount of information provided to them by the company rather they want a timely deliver and that too without paying any extra penny. If the company fails in delivering the product on time or fail to achieve the expected satisfaction, then the company may lose a customer. Hence, consumer decision-making is a function of customer's needs, desires, and wants. Organisations often fail to achieve the desired level of data related to consumer behaviour due to its unpredictable and ever-changingnature. Marketers often make use of various approaches and tools in order to retain its customers and offers many services, such as discounts, free delivery, rebates, money back guarantee, etc. Therefore, this study is very significant as it would be analysing many similar factors and their impact on consumer behaviour (Wolny and Charoensuksai, 2014).

This research is being carried out to understand what factors can have significant effects on consumer decision making while making a purchase on any e-commerce websites. The topic is significant because it will help the organisation to achieve customer satisfaction and increase their revenues and sales. They can tailor their services in accordance with those factors and determinants of consumer decision-making. A deep understanding of consumer decision-making is important as it leads to customer satisfaction and loyalty. In addition to this, it helps the company to deliver products and services (Karimi, 2013).

The study of consumer behaviour and the factors affecting it is crucial for the business manager, marketers, and salesperson in many ways. The data regarding consumer decision-making can help the organisation in delivering the best possible product that fulfils the customer's needs and demands.In addition, it assists the online retailers to provide services in an easy way. The company can set price in order to grab the consumer's attention. For the study purpose, Amazon, the giant e-commerce company has been chosen. As a part of the research work, various determinants of customer behavior in an online retailing environment will be identified. According to Lysonski and Durvasula, (2013), customer's lifestyle characteristics when clubbed with their demographic characteristics strongly impact the final decision-making of the customer who is willing to make an online purchase (Lysonski and Durvasula, 2013). Based on the lifestyle characteristics and demographic data, the following study will investigate the e-commerce business and elucidate consumer's choices for the products offered by these giants.

Purpose of the Study

This study started with a notion of studying consumer decision-making. Later on, the topic was narrowed down to a particular field in order to bring more clarity to the concept. To specify the research, a number of emerging and interesting topics were listed down and e-commerce was taken up. There many reasons for conducting a research on the following topic of consumer decision-making. Before e-commerce organisation develops marketing strategies, it is needed from that they must identify and understand the factors that can affect the buying behaviour and how they manipulate the customers to purchase a specific factor only in order to satisfy their desires and needs (Jahromi, et.al, 2014). The investigation aims at gathering the data about consumer's perception and psychology towards buying products and availing services from e-commerce giant Amazon. This would help in increasing the business by developing sound strategies based on their purchasing attitude. There are various stages in the industrial life cycle and through this research, one can understand the stage with which the brand is associated. This study also helps in knowing about the best features of the products the company is offering and where they are lagging behind (Trainor, et.al 2014). In short, the study will highlight the strengths and weaknesses of the company in the later stage. In addition, it will also cover the features and information a consumer seeks while making a purchase from a particular brand.

Furthermore, the ultimate purpose of carrying out this study is to provide some suggestions regarding the company to excel in the e-commerce market. There is a strong need for understanding the consumer decision-making and this investigation can serve as a helping hand in providing an insight about it. This work will help in providing the knowledge of customer behaviour that would assist the marketers in planning and implementing the business strategies in order to boost their sales. Also, it will evidence the establishment of customer orientation in the field of marketing. The findings of the research can be used by the company to prepare the marketing mix (Hadjikhani and LaPlaca, 2013). Marketers can easily predict throw customers will respond to a particular strategy for marketing. The final motive of conducting this study is to determine the extent of understanding a business can possibly achieve in order to accomplish its commitments in a proactive and meaningful manner. This would help the business organisation to operate a free market system efficiently. Once, the overall research work gets completed, one can know easily how organisation just by controlling and understanding the consumer decision-making retain and sustain its customers.

Research Question

Primary Question

Can consumer decision-making impact the e-commerce industry?

Secondary Question

What are the factors that can influence the customer's decision-making process?
What constitute the decision-makingin online retail?
What methods can be used by e-commerce to take care of the risk associated with consumer decision-making?

Research Hypothesis

Consumer decision-making impacts the e-commerce industry.
Consumer decision-making assists online retailers to provide services in an easy way.
Consumer behaviour depends on the amount of knowledge available to them on e-commerce platforms.
Buying behaviour is more of a decision process and depends on the people involved in the process of purchasing goods and services.

Conclusion

In this research proposal report, a lot of information was provided on consumer behaviour. It was found that consumers want to purchase or avail services in order to satisfy their needs and wants. In this report, the statement of the problem was provided, in which the importance of the topic was elaborated and the need for conducting the following investigation was also highlighted. Furthermore, the document also mentioned the purpose of the study in which the anticipated benefits and outcomes of the study to different stakeholders, such as researchers, societies, and organisations was discussed. In addition to this, the following research proposal document outlined the research questions and research hypothesis.

References

Ashman, R., Solomon, M.R. and Wolny, J., 2015. An old model for a new age: Consumer decision making in participatory digital culture. Journal of Customer Behaviour, 14(2), pp.127-146.
Hadjikhani, A. and LaPlaca, P., 2013. Development of B2B marketing theory. Industrial Marketing Management, 42(3), pp.294-305.
Jahromi, A.T., Stakhovych, S. and Ewing, M., 2014. Managing B2B customer churn, retention and profitability. Industrial Marketing Management, 43(7), pp.1258-1268.
Karimi, S., 2013. A purchase decision-making process model of online consumers and its influential factors cross sector analysis [online]. Available at: https://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/uk-ac-man-scw:189583. [Accessed 12 Oct, 2018].
Lysonski, S. and Durvasula, S., 2013. Consumer decision making styles in retailing: evolution of mindsets and psychological impacts. Journal of Consumer Marketing, 30(1), pp.75-87.
Professional Academy, 2015. Marketing theories – explaining the consumer decision-making process [online]. Available at: https://www.professionalacademy.com/blogs-and-advice/marketing-theories---explaining-the-consumer-decision-making-process. [Accessed on12 Oct 2018].
Shiau, W.L. and Luo, M.M., 2012. Factors affecting online group buying intention and satisfaction: A social exchange theory perspective. Computers in Human Behavior, 28(6), pp.2431-2444.
Trainor, K.J., Andzulis, J.M., Rapp, A. and Agnihotri, R., 2014. Social media technology usage and customer relationship performance: A capabilities-based examination of social CRM. Journal of Business Research, 67(6), pp.1201-1208.
Trueblood, J.S., Brown, S.D., Heathcote, A. and Busemeyer, J.R., 2013. Not just for consumers: Context effects are fundamental to decision making. Psychological science, 24(6), pp.901-908.
Wolny, J. and Charoensuksai, N., 2014. Mapping customer journeys in multichannel decision-making. Journal of Direct, Data and Digital Marketing Practice, 15(4), pp.317-326.