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ABSTRACT
Customer value is the foremost driver of competitive advantage in the Internet shopping environment. The authors of this study identify two types of online shopping values - utilitarian value (including price savings, service excellence, time savings, and selection dimensions) and experiential value (including entertainment, visual, escape, and interaction dimensions). Using structural equation modeling, the impact of these online shopping values upon consumers' satisfaction and loyalty is examined. The results of this study indicate that Internet shopping does indeed invoke various types of shopping values. Both utilitarian and experiential values positively affected customer satisfaction, leading to heightened loyalty. Discussions of the results and managerial implications are offered.
INTRODUCTION
The growth of Internet commerce in both business-to-business and business-to-consumer marketplaces has escaped no one in recent years. The popular press and slowly the academic press have begun to consider the influence of issues such as flow (Novak, Hoffman, and Yung 2000), electronic service quality (Zeithaml, Parasuraman, and Malhotra 2000), and fundamental objectives related to Internet commerce (Keeney 1999). At the same time, we have witnessed the rapid demise of some electronic retailers and even assertions that retail sales via Internet commerce are "unimpressive" (Burke 1997). Despite the phenomenal increase of wired populations, the conversion rate - the number of visitors who come to a particular retail site divided by the number of actual buyers - was only 1.8 percent, according to a 1999 survey by Boston Consulting Group and Shop.org (Boston Consulting Group 2000). Surprisingly, two-thirds of online shoppers filled their electronic shopping carts but exited at the check out point without making any purchase (Gurley 2000; Rewick 2000).
In fact, Burke (1997) asserts that most home shopping services have failed to deliver promised benefits, such as time savings, accurate product information, and lower prices. Recent academic and popular press articles have asserted that one-third of experienced Internet surfers find online shopping difficult (see Seminerio 1998; Burke 1997); failing companies devote too much effort to "over-fancy" sites (Mitchell 2000); and e-tailers pour too much money into ads designed to attract visitors and casual browsers rather than spending money on developing "sticky" web content that will keep buyers loyal to a site (Crockett 2000). Because online shoppers choose retailers who offer the best value -...