Critical review of the e-loyalty literature: a purchase-centred framework

Over the last few years, the concept of online loyalty has been examined extensively in the literature, and it remains a topic of constant inquiry for both academics and marketing managers. The tremendous development of the Internet for both marketing and e-commerce settings, in conjunction with the growing desire of consumers to purchase online, has promoted two main outcomes: (a) increasing numbers of Business-to-Customer companies running businesses online and (b) the development of a variety of different e-loyalty research models. However, current research lacks a systematic review of the literature that provides a general conceptual framework on e-loyalty, which would help managers to understand their customers better, to take advantage of industry-related factors, and to improve their service quality. The present study is an attempt to critically synthesize results from multiple empirical studies on e-loyalty. Our findings illustrate that 62 instruments for measuring e-loyalty are currently in use, influenced predominantly by Zeithaml et al. (J Marketing. 1996;60(2):31-46) and Oliver (1997; Satisfaction: a behavioral perspective on the consumer. New York: McGraw Hill). Additionally, we propose a new general conceptual framework, which leads to antecedents dividing e-loyalty on the basis of the action of purchase into pre-purchase, during-purchase and after-purchase factors. To conclude, a number of managerial implementations are suggested in order to help marketing managers increase their customers’ e-loyalty by making crucial changes in each purchase stage

A Survey of Literature on Genetically Modified Crops: Economics, Ethics and Society

This paper reports on a review of literature in the form of academic papers and published research on ethical and consumer issues for GM crops in North America, with particular emphasis on GM wheat. The issues raised in these papers and the findings and arguments posed by the authors are outlined. A general conclusion that can be drawn from this overview is that public attitudes toward GM foods are diverse and sometimes quite strongly held. The strong negative views of GM food held by some appear to be mainly grounded in individuals’ ethical or moral values. Ethical and risk assessment issues have not been fully explored in the existing literature. There is a general consensus in the applied economics literature that GM crops result in economic benefits, although benefits to individual consumers may not be great enough to overcome perceived risk. Carefully planned provision of credible information informing members of the public of benefits and related issues of concern or costs associated with agricultural biotechnology may have benefits for farm and industry groups, but maintenance of trust in information sources and content is vital to credibility. The discovery and use of genomic techniques that express explicit consumer benefits may lead to more favourable attitudes by many consumers.Crop Production/Industries, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, I00, Q16, Q18,

Trust and Experience in Online Auctions

This paper aims to shed light on the complexities and difficulties in predicting the effects of trust and the experience of online auction participants on bid levels in online auctions. To provide some insights into learning by bidders, a field study was conducted first to examine auction and bidder characteristics from eBay auctions of rare coins. We proposed that such learning is partly because of institutional-based trust. Data were then gathered from 453 participants in an online experiment and survey, and a structural equation model was used to analyze the results. This paper reveals that experience has a nonmonotonic effect on the levels of online auction bids. Contrary to previous research on traditional auctions, as online auction bidders gain more experience, their level of institutional-based trust increases and leads to higher bid levels. Data also show that both a bidder’s selling and bidding experiences increase bid levels, with the selling experience having a somewhat stronger effect. This paper offers an in-depth study that examines the effects of experience and learning and bid levels in online auctions. We postulate this learning is because of institutional-based trust. Although personal trust in sellers has received a significant amount of research attention, this paper addresses an important gap in the literature by focusing on institutional-based trust

Digital Media and Youth: Unparalleled Opportunity and Unprecedented Responsibility

Part of the Volume on Digital Media, Youth, and Credibility This chapter argues that understanding credibility is particularly complex -- and consequential -- in the digital media environment, especially for youth audiences, who have both advantages and disadvantages due to their relationship with contemporary technologies and their life experience. The chapter explains what is, and what is not, new about credibility in the context of digital media, and discusses the major thrusts of current credibility concerns for scholars, educators, and youth

Factors Influencing Online Consumers' Intention to Purchase in an Online Auction and Shopping Website in Thailand

Online sales method is significantly becoming a fast business. Specially, online auction and shopping website have also become rapidly growth and more and more suppliers and consumers are entering this market. Therefore, the factors influencing online consumers’ intention to purchase is the key factor determining how attractive them to purchase good and products with on online auction and shopping website. The study examines the factors influencing between online information system quality, online auction price, and online service quality toward online consumers’ intention to purchase in an online auction and shopping website in Thailand. The questionnaires were developed from many previous researches. The data was collected from 397 online consumers of Sanook.com. Pearson’s Correlation Coefficient Analysis and Multiple Regressions were used to test the hypotheses. The results of this study show that online information system quality has positive relationship to online consumers’ intention to purchase as hypothesized. Online auction price and online service quality also have the significant and positive relationship with online consumers’ intention to purchase. This study shows that the perception of online consumer about online information system quality, online auction price, and online service quality are almost equally important to influence their attraction. Moreover, among the three factors, online auction price is the most significant influence toward online consumers’ intention to purchase

A Study of Ecommerce Risk Perceptions among B2C Consumers: A Two Country Study

The ecommerce environment is fairly new, and several risks associated with it are novel to consumers. Consequently, e-consumers may not have developed an appropriate mental picture (i.e., a schema or a perceptual map) of these risks. For example, identity theft, a serious risk that became prominent after ecommerce has become popular, is still not well understood by most consumers. Thus, it is not clear how consumers participating in ecommerce perceive the risks. Existing ecommerce studies do not focus on risk per se; instead, they use very general constructs and measures of risk derived from general psychology and management studies in contexts other than ecommerce. Implicit in these studies is the assumption that the dimensions of perceived risk in ecommerce context are well understood. In this study, we use the psychometric paradigm to investigate how consumers organize novel online risks in memory. Data collected from consumers in two countries and analyzed using Multidimensional Scaling techniques shows significant differences in how consumers organize risks in their memory. This study is still in progress and preliminary analysis is presented