Added by Chanaka.j, 38 weeks ago

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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the purchase intentions of online retail consumers,
segmented by their purchase orientation.
Design/methodology/approach – An e-mail/web survey was addressed to a consumer panel
concerning their online shopping experiences and motivations, n ¼ 396.
Findings – It is empirically shown that consumer purchase orientations have no significant effect on
their propensity to shop online. This contradicts the pervasive view that internet consumers are
principally motivated by convenience. It was found that aspects that do have a significant effect on
purchase intention are prior purchase and gender.
Research limitations/implications – There are two limitations. First, the sample contained only
UK internet users, thus generalisations about the entire population of internet users may be
questionable. Second, in our measurement of purchase intentions, we did not measure purchase intent
per se.
Practical implications – These findings indicate that consumer purchase orientations in both the
traditional world and on the internet are largely similar. Therefore, both academics and businesses
are advised to treat the internet as an extension to existing traditional activities brought about by
advances in technology, i.e. the multi-channel approach.
Originality/value – The paper adds to the understanding of the purchase orientations of different
clusters of e-consumers.