ANALYSIS OF CUSTOMER ATTITUDE FACTORS TOWARDS ONLINE PURCHASE INTENTIONS OF BABY PRODUCTS IN CHENNAI

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1 International Journal of Civil Engineering and Technology (IJCIET) Volume 9, Issue 8, August 2018, pp , Article ID: IJCIET_09_08_149 Available online at ISSN Print: and ISSN Online: IAEME Publication Scopus Indexed ANALYSIS OF CUSTOMER ATTITUDE FACTORS TOWARDS ONLINE PURCHASE INTENTIONS OF BABY PRODUCTS IN CHENNAI E. Pradeep Assistant Professor, Faculty of Management, SRM Institute of Science & Technology, Kattankulathur, Chennai, India Dr. V. M. Shenbagaraman Professor, Faculty of Management, SRM Institute of Science & Technology, Kattankulathur, Chennai, India Dr. P. Saravanan Assistant Professor, Faculty of Management, SRM Institute of Science & Technology, Kattankulathur, Chennai, India ABSTRACT Due to the huge amount of disposable income in hands, parents are willing to spend to a great extent for their babies and kids and they want the best out of them. They will never compromise on quality at all, even though they are willing to pay a slightly higher price for it. Online retailing is growing due to various reasons such as independent family with both mother and father are working, traffic, parking issues, time saving, easy pay options, flexible return policies etc. In this scenario, quality of the product, safety and trust factors plays challenging scenario. Hence a study required for analysing online purchase intentions of baby products buying. This study is focusing one aspect of the same i.e. attitude. Hence study was conducted to analyse the factors influencing on attitude of the customers in terms of price and product delivery aspects in order to determine online purchase intentions of baby products in Chennai. A structured questionnaire was prepared and data collected from 134 respondents based on judgemental sampling method by using online Google forms. Collected data were analysed and results revealed that, quality of product was identified as very important factor in overall customer satisfaction and followed by timely delivery, payment comfort and price preference. Hence this study recommends that, online retailers have to concentrate on above factors while selling baby products through online. Key words: Online Purchase Intention, Baby products, Attitude, Price, Customer satisfaction editor@iaeme.com

2 E. Pradeep, Dr. V. M. Shenbagaraman and Dr. P. Saravanan Cite this Article: E. Pradeep, Dr. V. M. Shenbagaraman and Dr. P. Saravanan, Analysis of Customer Attitude Factors Towards Online Purchase Intentions of Baby Products in Chennai. International Journal of Civil Engineering and Technology, 9(8), 2018, pp INTRODUCTION Nowadays, a huge array of baby products is available to cater to the needs of parents and babies, from top to toe. Having a baby is now a major milestone, especially for Indian couples, and it gives them a great sense of happiness, accomplishment and joy. Earlier, couples used to have many children. Now, owing to the huge surge in cost of living, every household has only one or a maximum of 2 kids. Earlier, moms were mostly homemakers and they took care of the babies mostly themselves. Now, as most of the mothers have also started working, they also need some products to make baby care easier for them. Also due to the huge amount of disposable income in hands, parents are willing to spend to a great extent for their babies and kids and they want the best out of them. They will never compromise on quality at all, even though they are willing to pay a slightly higher price for it. For example, branded toys come with safety features for children. They do not have sharp edges, uneven surfaces, with gentle lights and sounds which do not startle little ones. But unbranded cheap toys are available in the market, which do not have a neat finish with bizarre lights and sounds. Though branded toys are highly priced parents go for it, due to the quality which they offer. Parents are not willing to take any risks when it comes to their little ones. As both the parents are working, they are not having the sufficient time and energy to purchase each and every product, going to a physical shop. Braving the traffic of major cities like Chennai is also a Himalayan task. Hence most of the people have now resorted to online shopping. E-retailing is the current buzzword, in the present scenario. Bearing this in mind, e-retailers are offering quite a lot of discounts and offers to attract customers. And they also keep the websites user friendly as much as possible, with lot of filter options to narrow down their search and locate the exact product in a short span of time, various payment modes and shorter delivery times. Babies are extremely sensitive and if a product does not satisfy the customers needs and wants and does more harm to the baby, parents never ever return back to that product, however, the brand claims it to be safe and sound for babies and kids. Eg. Johnson and Johnson. Customers, especially parents never take the chance of trying it out again, once having encountered a bitter experience. Hence the purchase intentions of the baby products are very specific and they see that these products are fulfilling the needs. This paper explains the factors affecting the online purchase intention of baby products. Some of the main attributes like attitude, price and customer satisfaction are discussed in this paper. Retailing accounts for over 10% of the GDP and 8% of the country s employment. It is emerging as the most dynamic industry and there are many players entering the market every other day. According to the GRDI (Global Retail Development Index) report, 2017 by A. T. Kearney, India is being named as the No. 1 developing country for retail investment. The strong GDP growth and the increasing middle class population have coupled to make it a more favourable country for retailing. Indian retail industry is set to grow 4 times within 2025 (McKinsey). The baby care segment is also likely to increase more than a CAGR of 17% within the time period editor@iaeme.com

3 Analysis of Customer Attitude Factors Towards Online Purchase Intentions of Baby Products in Chennai Baby care products include baby food, toiletries, toys and games, furniture and disposables like diapers. Rapid urbanization has also boosted the increase in sales of baby products and the market yet remains to be tapped completely. India accounts for more than 20% of the children in the world between ages 0-3, which is yet another reason for the growing demand of baby products in India. Online retailing is growing due to various reasons such as independent family with both mother and father are working, traffic, parking issues, time saving, easy pay options, flexible return policies etc. In this scenario, quality of the product, safety and trust factors plays challenging scenario. Hence a study required for analysing online purchase intentions of baby products buying. This study is focusing one aspect of the same i.e. attitude. Hence study was conducted to analyse the factors influencing on attitude of the customers in terms of price and product delivery aspects in order to determine online purchase intentions of baby products in Chennai. 2. REVIEW OF LITERATURE Parents are unable to judge the brand performance as the end-users are babies and toddlers, who are unable to communicate properly. Respondents considered manufacturer branded baby care products having better quality and lower risk than retail brand baby products (Broad bridge and Morgan, 2001) [1]. This study finds out that factors like awareness, opinion, consumer attitude, level of satisfaction urges a customer to buy baby products of leading brands namely Himalaya and Johnson & Johnson. (Mathuthra and Latha, 2016) [2]. This study points that to satisfy the needs and wants of the customer and to increase the market share, purchasing patterns of parents should be understood and this helps firms to devise strategies. (Kalaiselvi and Priya, 2013) [3]. Key factors which are influencing online purchase intentions of the fashion industry are trust, fashion innovativeness and perceived value, whereas the antecedents are perceived security and time saving to predict trust and perceived value respectively. (Escobar and Bonsón, 2017) [4] Not alone attitude influences purchase decisions of mobile phones through e-commerce websites, but also lifestyle and attitude influence purchase decisions (Selvakumar and Raghavan, 2017) [5]. Customers are very much attracted towards technology because it is convenient, time and effort saving. Websites should be quick, complete transactions quickly, user-friendly. Price sensitive customers choose the channel with more discounts and promotional offers so that they get the best deal for their money [6]. E-service scape dimensions like customization, financial security, aesthetic appeal and usability have a greater impact customers trust and attitudes towards websites [7]. Involvement with sustainability, perceived consumer effectiveness and certainty are individual characteristics which have a positive impact on buyer attitude and they correlate with purchase intentions (Vermier and Verbeke, 2004) [8] There is no significant difference between males and females on online purchase intentions being influenced by perceived usefulness and personal innovativeness (Chiu et al, 2005) [9]. Customer s online purchase intentions are positively affected by impulse purchase orientation, prior online purchase experience, brand orientation, online trust and perceived ease of use (Ahmad, a. (2017) [10]. Perceived flow and playfulness of customers are affected by website quality and that would have an impact on the purchase intentions and satisfaction.(hsu et. al, 2012) [11]. Consumer s emotion was positively affected by reputation and perceived risk is negatively affected by reputation. (Kim and Lennon, 2013) [12]. Empathy and trust directly predict online purchase intentions and service providers should make a note of it and provide service accordingly (Sam et. al, 2009) [13]. Enjoyment/ease, editor@iaeme.com

4 E. Pradeep, Dr. V. M. Shenbagaraman and Dr. P. Saravanan social pressure, satisfaction and perceived trust are related to user intention which was a significant mediating factor for actual usage (Akman and Mishra, 2017) [14]. Website quality and brand affect trust and perceived risk of customers purchase intentions and branding is also equally important to influence online purchase intentions. Also trust is inversely related to perceived risk (Hsin and Wen, 2008) [15]. Product brand image directly and indirectly influence purchase intentions. Online store image can also influence purchase intentions indirectly when risk perceptions are decreased. (Aghekyan-Simonian et. al, 2012) [16]. 3. OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY To analyse the factors influencing on attitude of the customers in terms of price and product delivery aspects in order to determine online purchase intentions of baby products in Chennai. 4. METHODOLOGY This study is designed based on the descriptive research method. The scope of respondents was limited to people those who are purchasing baby products through online, in the city of Chennai. Respondents can be those who have kids, or not. It could also be those who purchase baby products for others such as other family members, relatives and friends and may be for gifting purposes too. A structured questionnaire was prepared which included basic demography details, website attributes, buying behaviour and other related questions. Data were collected to a tune of 150 respondents, of which 16 were poor and incomplete responses, and were rejected. Around 134 responses were finally considered for data analysis. Data were collected using the survey methodology by non-probability cum judgemental sampling method as the person collecting the data has to make sure, whether the respondent has purchased any baby product through online earlier or not, before asking a respondent to fill up the questionnaire. The data collected was analysed using the SPSS software package by deploying various statistical tools such as frequency analysis, factor analysis, regression analysis and reliability analysis and the results are explained below. 5. DATA ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION 5.1. Frequency Analysis A frequency analysis was carried out for the demography details entered to get a basic understanding about the respondents. There were 53% male respondents and 47% female respondents. Around, 65% were between 18 to 30 years of age and 35% 30 years and above. Since this study included respondents who had also bought for others, 37% of unmarried respondents and 63% of them were married. Education qualification of the total respondents is listed hereby; 2% SSC/HSC, 1% were Diploma holders, 19% were Undergraduates, 75% were Post graduates and 3% others. Also there were 14% Business people, 2% Government employees, 73% private employees, 1% students and 6% homemakers. Also among the total respondents, 37% received an income of lesser than Rs.30,000 per month and the remaining 63% received above Rs.30,000 per month. This study also includes 15% from North Chennai zone, 18% Central Chennai and 77% South Chennai zone. Around 51% of the total respondents have children and 32% of respondents had one child under the age of 4 years and 6% had two children less than 4 years. Among the total respondents around 37% have made their last purchase less than 1 month, 29% between the last 1 to 6 months, 8% between the previous 6 months to 1 year and 26% have last purchased 1 year ago. And 45% of the respondents purchased for their own kids, 28% purchased for their family members and 27% for gifting purposes to others. Also 77% of respondents were using mobile phones to purchase, 15% laptops, 5% desktops and 3% tablets for purchasing editor@iaeme.com

5 Analysis of Customer Attitude Factors Towards Online Purchase Intentions of Baby Products in Chennai baby products online. Among the respondents 27% spend less than Rs.500, 37% spend between Rs.501 to Rs.1000, 21% spend between Rs.1001 to Rs.1500 and 15% spend above Rs.1500 for baby products Reliability of Data Before analysing data, it is necessary to justify the quality of data. Quality of data for this study has been justified through reliability analysis by using Cronbach s alpha value. Reliability analysis was carried out for all eleven variables of attitude based factor. Cronbach s alpha value of all these variables was This value justified that, all data had 81.3 % of reliable in nature. Since 0.5 and above is acceptable range, was justified as very good. Hence quality of collected data was warranted as good quality and suitable for further analysis Factor Analysis To minimize the variables into few reasonable factors, a factor analysis was carried out. They are presented by categorizing into 3 segments such as KMO and Bartlett s test, total variance and the rotated component matrix. Sampling adequacy was justified by KMO test. Table 1 show as the sampling adequacy value which implies it has 77% of sampling adequacy. All the factors taken for this study were significant since its value as (p 0.05). Table 1 KMO and Bartlett's Test Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy.769 Approx. Chi-Square Bartlett's Test of Sphericity Component (Factors) Initial Eigenvalues df 55 Sig..000 Table 2 Total Variance Explained Extraction Sums of Squared Loadings Rotation Sums of Squared Loadings % of Cumulative % of Cumulative % of Total Total Total Variance % Variance % Variance Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis. Cumulative % A total variance of 62% (61.887) was explained through factor analysis by all variables (Table 2) with three different factors or components. These three factors were extracted using the principle component analysis method. The loadings of each variable were determined and rotated by Varimax rotation method. Rotations converged in 5 iterations. All the variables editor@iaeme.com

6 E. Pradeep, Dr. V. M. Shenbagaraman and Dr. P. Saravanan were categorized under these three different factors based on a loading value of 0.5 and above. Table 3 Rotated Component Matrix a Component Price.prefer.844 Discounts.784 Pay.comfort.547 COD.764 Mode.pay.847 Pack.delivery.653 Price.offer.531 Quality.prdt.501 Time.delivery.833 Return.policy.891 Guarantees.747 Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis. Rotation Method: Varimax with Kaiser Normalization. a. Rotation converged in 5 iterations. Table 3 shows the variables in specific factors. The first factor includes two variables such as price preferences and discount offers. This factor named as price. The second factor includes five other variables such as comfort of payment, cash on delivery, mode of payment, packaging delivery and price offer. This factor named as payment mode. Finally the third factor includes four variables such as quality product, delivery on time, return policy and guarantees. This factor is named as policy Regression Analysis Regression analysis was conducted by considering overall satisfaction on attitude (satisfactory attitudes) affecting online purchase intentions as the dependent variable and all the other eleven attitude based factors were considered as independent variables, Since all these factors were loaded with 0.5 and above in factor analysis. Regression analysis revealed the following findings; Model summary (Table 4) in regression analysis shows that R2 value of This justified that 82.4% of variance is explained by the variables which are considered in this study. ANOVA analysis (Table 5) in the regression analysis justified that all the variables which taken for regression analysis were significant, since significant value was (p 0.05) Table 4 Model Summary R R Square Adjusted R Square Std. Error of the Estimate.908 a a. Predictors: (Constant), Guarantees, Discounts, COD, Price.offer, Pay.comfort, Pack.delivery, Price.prefer, Quality.prdt, Time.delivery, Mode.pay, Return.policy 1 Table 5 ANOVA a Model Sum of Squares df Mean Square F Sig. Regression b Residual Total a. Dependent Variable: Overall editor@iaeme.com

7 Analysis of Customer Attitude Factors Towards Online Purchase Intentions of Baby Products in Chennai Table 6 Coefficients a Model Unstandardized Coefficients Standardized Coefficients t Sig. B Std. Error Beta (Constant) Price.prefer Discounts Pay.comfort COD Mode.pay Pack.delivery Price.offer Quality.prdt Time.delivery Return.policy Guarantees a. Dependent Variable: Overall Out of eleven variables, seven variables were turned to be significant such as price preference (0.004), discounts (0.023), pay comfort (0.002), cash on delivery (0.039), packing and delivery (0.045), quality of the product (0.000) and timely delivery (0.005). Influence of each factor decided based on Unstandardized Coefficients values. For example, increase of one unit in price preference would influence units of overall customer satisfaction. Increase of one unit in discount and payment comfort variables would increase and units of overall customer satisfaction respectively. Every one unit increase in cash on delivery and packing & delivery would improve and units of overall customer satisfaction respectively. Finally, each single unit increase in quality and timely delivery of the product would escalate and units of overall customer satisfaction respectively. Whereas, importance of these variables were decided based on standardized coefficients. In this study quality of product (0.223) was identified as very important factor in overall customer satisfaction and followed by timely delivery (0.203), payment comfort (0.159), and price preference (0.158). Hence this study strongly recommends online retailers have to concentrate more on quality of the product, timely delivery, payment comfort and price preference in order to increase overall satisfaction of customers. 6. CONCLUSIONS The baby care segment is in great demand due to the steadily growing economy and increase in the disposable incomes of households. Also online shopping is gaining more and more popularity due to the ease of access and reduction in commuting time. Most of the baby products are also bought online owing to the increasing segment of working mothers. Hence there is always a huge potential for purchasing baby products, online. This study reveals that that quality of product was identified as very important factor in overall customer satisfaction and followed by timely delivery, payment comfort and price preference. Hence this study recommends that, online retailers have to concentrate on above factors while selling baby products through online editor@iaeme.com

8 E. Pradeep, Dr. V. M. Shenbagaraman and Dr. P. Saravanan REFERENCES [1] Broadbridge, A., & Morgan, H. P. Retail-brand baby-products: What do consumers think?. Journal of Brand Management, 8(3), (2001), pp [2] Mathuthra, O., & Latha, D. K. Costumers Attitude towards Baby Products of Johnson & Johnson and Himalayan Products, Coimbatore City. International Journal of Applied Research, 2(6), (2016), pp [3] Dr. S. Kalaiselvi, Mrs. S. Mohana Priya, Women s perception towards baby food with special reference to Erode town, Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing & Management Review, ISSN , Vol.2 (6), June (2013) [4] Escobar-Rodríguez, T., & Bonsón-Fernández, R. (2017). Analysing online purchase intention in Spain: fashion e-commerce. Information Systems and e-business Management, 15(3), (2017), pp [5] Selvakumar, J. J., & Raghavan, N. R. Influence of Lifestyle and Attitude on Online Shopping. Asia Pacific Journal of Research, 1(55), (2017), pp [6] Yeo, V. C. S., Goh, S. K., & Rezaei, S. Consumer experiences, attitude and behavioral intention toward online food delivery (OFD) services. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 35, (2017), pp [7] Wu, W. Y., Quyen, P. T. P., & Rivas, A. A. A. How e-servicescapes affect customer online shopping intention: the moderating effects of gender and online purchasing experience. Information Systems and e-business Management, 15(3), (2017), pp [8] Vermeir, I., & Verbeke, W. Sustainable food consumption: Exploring the consumer attitude-behaviour gap. Ghent University, WP, 4,(2000), pp [9] Chiu, Y. B., Lin, C. P., & Tang, L. L. Gender differs: assessing a model of online purchase intentions in e-tail service. International journal of service industry management, 16(5), (2005), pp [10] Ahmad, a. (2017). The effect of brand orientation, impulse purchase orientation, online trust, prior online purchase experince, and perceived ease of use on online purchase intention for customer of online store tokopedia in surabaya (doctoral dissertation, universitas pelita harapan surabaya-department of business school-faculty of management). [11] Hsu, C. L., Chang, K. C., & Chen, M. C. The impact of website quality on customer satisfaction and purchase intention: perceived playfulness and perceived flow as mediators. Information Systems and e-business Management, 10(4), (2012), pp [12] Kim, J., & Lennon, S. J. Effects of reputation and website quality on online consumers' emotion, perceived risk and purchase intention: Based on the stimulus-organism-response model. Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, 7(1), (2013), pp [13] Sam, M., Fazli, M., & Tahir, M. N. H. Website quality and consumer online purchase intention of air ticket.(2009). [14] Akman, I., & Mishra, A. Factors influencing consumer intention in social commerce adoption. Information Technology & People, 30(2), (2017), pp [15] Hsin Chang, H., & Wen Chen, S. The impact of online store environment cues on purchase intention: Trust and perceived risk as a mediator. Online information review, 32(6), (2008), pp [16] Aghekyan-Simonian, M., Forsythe, S., Kwon, W. S., & Chattaraman, V. The role of product brand image and online store image on perceived risks and online purchase intentions for apparel. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 19(3), (2012), pp editor@iaeme.com