Factors That Influence Online Customer Buyer Behaviour - Research Proposal Example

Factors that Influence Online Customer Buyer Behaviour Research Brief Online Shopping Online shopping is a process where consumers buy goods and services directly from the seller in real-time. It occurs in most instances in the absence of intermediary services over the Internet. It is basically a form of electronic commerce. An online shop enables consumers to purchase goods without having to travel in person to the shopping centres. The process is also known as Business-to-consumer that is (B2C) online shopping. The purchasing of goods between two business entities is referred to as Business-to-Business (B2B) online shopping. In the recent years, the shopping has become popular and has increased its services to cater for the people in the upper class as well as those in the lower class (Pride et al 2009, 16). For one to use this service, they need to have a bank account, a debit card and a computer or access to one. This shows that the shopping is because of technology. The online shopping’s effects widened its target group to the people in the middle-class level as at first it was mainly used by young men with university education and high-income level. This change can be seen worldwide especially in USA whereby during the early years of the Internet there was exceedingly few women users but by the year 2001; the women were 52.8% of the population that was online. The consumers find the products that they are interested in by directly visiting a retailer’s website or by doing a search across many vendors using software by the name shopping search engine. This helps the consumer to accumulate as many goods as possible and chose from them (Canzer, 2006, 25). The next step is a check out process that follows in which the delivery and the payment information are usually collected if it is needed. The shoppers using the online method commonly use the credit card when making their payments but others just create accounts and are able to pay the goods and services using alternative ways like cash on delivery. Once the payments are done, the retailer transports the goods to the consumer and if they are downloadable, the consumer does so in his or her own computer (Tashakkori, 2003, 42). Consumer Buyer Behaviour According to the most recent research on the behaviours of consumers in the Internet, there are four groups, which are distinct from one another and with exceptionally different motivations and intentions. Some of the different tastes that are displayed by the buyers are entertainment; desire to get more information, desire for exploration and shopping purposes. Majority of adults who are young tend to be active seekers of information and the high level they acquire of technological confidence becomes an encouraging factor during research of products online. The consumers are nowadays able to get easily what they want and this has improved the living standards of the consumers (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008, 69). The Internet has also increased the consumers bargaining powers as most of the search engines allow consumers to get in touch with many retailers who deal with a specific type of goods. This gives the consumers opportunities to decide on where to shop, as the retailers have no control over the consumers (Banerjee, 1992, 69). The consumers also learn how to trust people. This happens because of the purchasing of goods from places that a consumer does not even know and yet trusts the people he or she has not seen. This behaviour is developed by the consumers due to the online shopping (Tashakkoori, 2003, 27). Research Aims and Objectives This research is aimed at finding out the factors that may affect consumer and buyer behaviour on online purchases (Dooley, 1997, 47). These effects differ from such factors as age, gender, and social economic statues. My aims and objectives are: a) To determine the extent to which external factors influence online customer behaviour b) Comparison of the prices of goods that are retailed online and those that are retailed in shopping centres or not online. This is trying to show the difference in the two types of goods. c) Finding out the age bracket that mostly uses the online shopping and the reasons for its use rather than buying at the shopping centres d) To assess the influence of cultural factors on online customer buyer behavior Research Questions In order to have a guide on my inquiry and in order to shed more light on my research there are two questions that are to be answered during the research. These questions will enable me to be able to interview the respondents. These questions are: I) How does culture influence the behaviour of buyers when they engage in online shopping? II) How do external factors influence the degree in which consumers engage in online shopping? Literature Review Before carrying out the actual research, it will be of great significance to revisit some relevant literature on marketing. This will provide some great insight on marketing especially those that affect the behaviour when in various buying scenarios. These books including those by Kotler, Flood among others will be of valuable importance in answering the questions so far outline in this proposal (Klaus-Peter et al 2010, p. 176). Some of the questions that one can ask him or herself regarding or this issues of online shopping some of these questions are; why do customers have to buy online? (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008, 103). How do buyers choose things to buy from many thousands commodities on offer? What are the things that go on inside a customer’s mind before he or she can purchase a product and after the purchase? The whole truth is that many people purchase things because of the influence of the whole host of emotions of reasons like image and esteem (Xiao & Benbasat, 2011, 173). These irrational reasons are normally hidden extraordinarily deep in our minds such that they are unnoticeable. This is mainly the main reason one sees a product online and he or she ends up purchasing it (Vlaar, 2000, 51). Research helps in finding the real reasons why people end up buying what they buy especially on online shopping. The buyer behaviours involve both simple and the complex mental process that happens in the buyers mind. Marketers cannot at any one-time capture the human nature in its entirety although it is a painless thing to learn a lot about customers using research. This is what is been encouraged in finding out why people are turning into online shopping and leaving the manual shopping which is a bit cheaper and more secure (Groucutt et al 2004, 44). It is sometimes extremely hard to figure out why people behave in some of the ways or what the behaviour will lead to in the future. Research is the study of sources and materials. The study is aimed at establishing facts that guide a person to reach new conclusions (Milne et al 2009, 452). The process followed during research is a critical factor as it has significant impacts on the conclusions that are to be deduced at the end of the research. There two types of research philosophies, which are interpretive research and positivism, research paradigm (Obstefeld, 1996, 61). Positivism is mostly the working with the observable social reality, which gives a product related to law-like generalisations that are similar to those that are produced by natural and physical scientists (Gay et al 2007, 18). Interpretive on the other hand is the philosophical stand which is concerned mainly with understanding the way the human beings make sense their surrounding world, the assumption made is that by the placing of people in their own social context. The paradigm that is to be adopted contains supremely fundamental assumptions on how the researcher imagines or views the world (Saunders et al 2007, 9) during the conduction of this research. This positive paradigm will be also significant as it will make it possible for the attained results after the research to be applied anywhere else including externally and even more broadly outside the study contest as the findings will be reliable and none biased (Jones & Beamish, 2006, 74). After the research is over, I the researcher will walk away comfortably without being attached to research any more as it will be self-explanatory and anybody will be able to interpret the data because it will be easily flamed (Su & Huang, 2011, 38). This will be achieved through principled representation of data like the use of charts for comparison and graphical representation of the data obtained. There will also be a constant flow of ideas making the results much better (Obstefeld, 1996, 78). The research strategies to be used are the case study, which is an approach of doing research involving an empirical investigation of an issue using multiple sources of evidence. The case study is the appropriate strategy as it gave much needed understanding (Sang & Chen, 2010, 6). The study case is closely aligned with triangulate and its primary benefits are that survey it brings about more data than other strategies. It is definite that this is the right and most appropriate method to be used in the research as the all the others have more weakness than this one method (Taylor, 2007, 93). Research Methodology Secondary data will be excessively utilized in this research in bid to establish the leading factors that influence online consumer buyer behaviour. In order to achieve this, online surveys and questionnaires through social networks like facebook and surveymonkey.com that will be used. Secondary data constitutes the information that has already been collected and stored safely in books journals, and other storage media (Saunders, et al 2007, 26). The secondary data may vary in a number of ways because of the existing typologies like multiple sources, survey and documentary. Anticipated method of data analysis and findings: The results obtained will be useful in the making of vivid conclusions about the research carried out. This will be possible through the drawing of graphs and charts as one of the primary methods of data analysis. Data analysis is a process of cleaning, inspecting, modelling and transforming data with a goal of getting useful information, which can suggest conclusion and can also support decision-making (Saunders, 2007, 29). This process can also be described as method that frequently aims at describing facts, developing explanation and identifying patterns relating to a phenomenon under study (Dellarocas, 2010, 133). Data analysis is important in showing the vital information and recommending conclusion, which eventually help during the decision-making process. The data that is obtained during a research can be analysed using various ways, which include content analysis, thematic analysis, and use of theoretic samples. Content analysis is a research technique on the objective and quantities explanation of an obvious substance in communication (Bernard 1952, 46). Thematic analysis is the approach of dealing with data involving the creation and application of codes. Discovered in 1967 by Grasser and Strauss grounded theory is used in analyzing data with the intention of a better understanding of the phenomenon being studied (Robson, 2002, 72). Ethical Considerations It is important to appreciate the fact that this research will dwell much on quantitative data. One of the driving forces of this idea is the fact that it is enthusiastically and publicly available and acquiring it does not violate any ethical rules (Feng & Xiaoquan, 2010, 133). This is because the respondents will be volunteers and they will be armed with the risks and procedures that are involved during the research. The confidentiality of all the participants is highly practiced and respected except on agreement the respondent gives approval (Ozuem, 2004, 29). Conclusion According to the planning and strategies that are to be used in the research it is clear that this will be, a successful research .It will be also a helpful research to the online buyers because it will analyse every single detail of the buying. The research will be usable in every part of the world because it will be conducted in all the places ensuring that it is useful to all the people (Pride et al 2009, 20). The research will be of considerable help to the online buyers, as they will be made aware of the challenges and advantages that are experienced in the buying .This helps the buyers to keep away from the unsafe buying. The rules and regulations of the online buying will also be analyzed in order to ensure that they are open and clear to every person who is a potential online buyer (Krugman, 1979, 36). Research has proven to be the only way out to knowing why some people have to do some of the things that they do. The use of things like models can also be criticised but they can as well provide a checklist for marketing plan. This is because they can help in giving useful insight in the confusing buying process, which is recently at the markets core (Robson, 2002, 11). An individual may also look at the group in which he or she is being associated with and this gives an impression on how one is supposed to be staying. This is a lousy way of living as one may not be able to afford all what others are affording or one might not be in the class he or she is being associated with and this leads to spending beyond one’s ability which intern leads to frustrations. This is a clear indication that much of the marketing efforts go into identifying and into converting opinion readers in a particular referencing group. The followers who specialise on giving opinions try following the readers by limiting them and some other times purchasing the same brands (Saunders, 2007, 38). 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