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The number of consumers buying online and the amount being spent by online buyers has been on the rise; Forrester Research has estimated Internet sales in 2000 to be more than double that of 1999, $45 billion. In comparison, overall retail sales in the U.S. totaled $13 trillion in 2000. Thus, e-commerce sales currently account for only about 2.4% of retail sales, and experts and scholars have argued over the possible upper limit to the percentage of consumer online spending. Will the upper limit of online spending exceed that of other direct marketing at 8%?1 Or will it be as much as one third of purchases in many retail product categories by 2010, as recently suggested by Forrester Research?
Ultimately, the degree to which online shopping fulfills goal-oriented and/or experiential consumer needs will affect the amount of shopping dollars that consumers will choose to spend in each environment. While many writers are touting the unique capabilities of the online medium to provide interactivity and personalized experiences, few have focused systematically on what online shoppers really desire and why they are shopping online in the first place. Clearly understanding what motivates consumers to shop online can and should inform strategy, technology, and marketing decisions as well as web site design. So, what motivates online shopping? In the offline environment, marketers recognize that consumers shop differently depending on whether their motivations for searching are primarily experiential (for fun) or goal directed (for efficiency)2. Our research of online customers suggests that these two motivations generalize to the online environment as well.
Experiential behavior is especially likely in categories where shoppers have an ongoing, hobby-type interest. Collectors and hobbyists enjoy the "thrill of the hunt" as much as the acquisition of items for the collection. In addition, having time available and desiring stimulation results in more experiential shopping behavior. Scholars have also discovered that the higher playfulness associated with experiential behavior results in a more positive mood, greater shopping satisfaction, and a higher likelihood of impulse purchasing compared to goal-- focused shopping.3
Goal-oriented or utilitarian shopping has been described by various marketing scholars as task-oriented, efficient, rational, and deliberate.4 Thus, goal-- focused shoppers are transaction-oriented and desire to purchase what they want quickly and without distraction. Retailing consumers describe...