The author systematically examines one of the important issues of information — establishing the market price. He introduces the concept of «search» — where a buyer wanting to get a better price, is forced to question sellers. The article deals with various aspects of finding the necessary information.

Economics of Information

The authors examine the implications of electronic shopping for consumers, retailers, and manufacturers. They assume that near-term technological developments will offer consumers unparalleled opportunities to locate and compare product offerings. They examine these advantages as a function of typical consumer goals and the types of products and services being sought and offer conclusions regarding consumer incentives and disincentives to purchase through interactive home shopping vis-à-vis traditional retail formats. The authors discuss implications for industry structure as they pertain to competition among retailers, competition among manufacturers, and retailer-manufacturer relationships.

Interactive home shopping: Consumer, retailer, and manufacturer incentives to participate in

Since the late 1990s, online shopping has taken off as an increasing number of consumers purchase increasingly diversified products on the Internet. Given that how to attract and retain consumers is critical to the success of online retailers, research on the antecedents of consumer acceptance of online shopping has attracted widespread attention. There has yet to be a holistic view of online shopping acceptance from the perspective of consumers. In this research, we conducted an extensive survey of extant related studies and synthesized their findings into a reference model called OSAM (Online Shopping Acceptance Model) to explain consumer acceptance of online shopping. Our literature survey reveals that a myriad of factors have been examined in the context of online shopping and mixed results on those factors have been reported. The proposed model helps reconcile conflicting findings, discover recent trends in this line of research, and shed light on future research directions.

/pdf/online-shopping-acceptance-model-a-critical-survey-of-35n2uwe877.pdf

Online shopping acceptance model — a critical survey of consumer factors in online shopping

Integrating Bricks with Clicks: Retailer-Level and Channel-Level Outcomes of Online–Offline Channel Integration

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine how the nature of consumers' relationship with a brand influences brand evangelism, which represents an intense form of brand support behavior. Specifically, the study investigates the influence of two consumer-brand relational constructs, brand trust and brand identification, on brand evangelism. Brand evangelism, conceptualized as an amalgam of adoption and advocacy behaviors, is operationalized in terms of three supportive behaviors: purchase intentions, positive referrals, and oppositional brand referrals. Design/methodology/approach – Drawing from prior research on consumer-brand relationships, a framework of brand relationships and brand evangelism is developed. To provide a more robust test of theory, consumers' extraversion, gender, and brand experience are included as control variables. Structural equation modeling is used to test the proposed hypotheses. Findings – The findings reveal that consumer-brand relationships influence brand evangelism, ...

The influence of brand trust and brand identification on brand evangelism

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine the simultaneous effects of the product, brand, and vendor trust beliefs on consumers' online intentions, i.e. the intention to purchase and the intention to provide personal information online.Design/methodology/approach – The study uses an online 2×2×2 between‐subjects factorial experiment design with two vendor trust beliefs levels (high/low), two brand trust beliefs levels (high/low), and two product trust beliefs levels (high/low). Multivariate analysis of covariance, linear regression, and the SOBEL test were used to analyze the hypotheses.Findings – The results suggest that brand trust beliefs affect online intentions, and may be needed to increase online sales. The influence of vendor trust beliefs on online intentions varies with brand trust, beliefs for products and for services is augmented by brand trust beliefs.Research limitations/implications – The limitations are those typically applied to experimental methodology. Intentions were used as s...

Effects of trust beliefs on consumers' online intentions

Drawing from research on retailing, online shopping behavior, and theories of cognitive psychology, we develop and test a framework that investigates purchase intentions in online stores of multi-channel retailers. The framework simultaneously examines the influence of transference of attitude and trust from the multi-channel retailer’s physical to online stores, image congruence between the multi-channel retailer’s physical and online stores, and image congruence between the multi-channel retailer’s online store and a prototypical online store. Further, recognizing that several retailers now operate as multi-channel retailers in different countries, we examine the influence of cultural differences in thought processes (i.e., holistic versus analytic thinking) on shoppers’ evaluation of online stores of multi-channel retailers. Toward this end, we test the framework using data collected from respondents in the U.S. (analytic thinkers) and South Korea (holistic thinkers). We conclude with a discussion of the findings, suggestions for future research, and potential limitations.

/pdf/transference-and-congruence-effects-on-purchase-intentions-2rlil4tve5.pdf

Transference and congruence effects on purchase intentions in online stores of multi-channel retailers: initial evidence from the U.S. and South Korea

Purpose – Brands can imbue unique meaning to consumers, and such meaning and personal experience with a brand can create an emotional connection and relationship between the consumer and the brand. Just as many service providers have adopted branding strategies, marketers are branding the health care service experience. Health care is an intimate service experience and emotions play an integral role in health care decision making. The purpose of this paper is to examine how emotional or affect-based consumer brand relationships are developed for health care organizations. Design/methodology/approach – Empirical evidence from both depth interviews and data garnered from 322 surveys were integrated into a conceptual model. The model was tested using structural equation modeling. Findings – Results indicate that trust, referent influence and corporate social responsibility are key variables in establishing affective commitment in consumer brand relationships in a health care context. Once affective commitmen...

Healthcare branding: developing emotionally based consumer brand relationships

https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1033&context=bus_facpub

Enrique P. Becerra

Papers

The influence of brand trust and brand identification on brand evangelism

Effects of trust beliefs on consumers' online intentions

Transference and congruence effects on purchase intentions in online stores of multi-channel retailers: initial evidence from the U.S. and South Korea

Healthcare branding: developing emotionally based consumer brand relationships

Influence of congruity in store-attribute dimensions and self-image on purchase intentions in online stores of multichannel retailers