(solved) BUSN20016 Research in Business

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
Practical and Written assessment – 1
Project outline
MANAGEMENT PERCEPTION OF
CUSTOMER EXPECTATION FOR ONLINE SHOPPING

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
Table of Contents
Statement of the problem.......................................................................................................................................3
Research aim and objectives..................................................................................................................................3
Literature review...................................................................................................................................................7
Research methodology..........................................................................................................................................8
Data collection...................................................................................................................................................... 9
Quantitative method..............................................................................................................................................9
Reference............................................................................................................................................................ 10

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
Statement of the problem
Nowadays, the customers are more interested in the online shopping rather than going to the
shopping malls. They feel more confident in the design, quality and fitting style of the online
products even without touching the product physically. However, customers are doing online
shopping nowadays and decide to purchase that product without touching and just looking at
the description list. The description list that is provided on the site, describes the entire details
of the product which is quite necessary for a customer before making their decisions.
The theories of the consumers' expectations are based on the online shopping rather than on
the visual attention (Al-Debei, Akroush & Ashouri, 2015). Therefore, they believe that the
image and the description that is provided on the website are the true facts about the product.
This scenario raises the expectation level of the customer to a great extent. Unfortunately,
their expectations didn't reach to that level. The much-awaited product didn't fulfill the
demands and desires of the customers (Anaza, 2014). The visualization of the product fails
and brings disappointments among them. This leads to the poor selling of the product over
the web.
According to reports, there are notably less research and expectation, which is quite essential
for the online managers as well as for the store managers. The aim of this research is to
investigate the various characteristics of the online shopping that mainly focus on the product
quality which is quite different from the customer's expectation those who are buying it form
online and the reality of the product while touching them (Ashraf, Thongpapanl & Auh,
2014). Eventually, the research makes a good recommendation about the management of the
customer's perception as well as about their expectation when managing the quality of the
product coming from online sources.
Research aim and objectives
The aim of this entire study is to research on the customer expectation on the quality of the
product when they are doing the online shopping:
- What is the expectation when doing online shopping?
The expectations of the customers from the online websites are as follows:

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
1. The pricing and shipping information should be clearly stated: according to several reports
and study, the unexpected inflation of the final price on the product due to extra shipping and
taxes, are the main reason for the cart abandonment. The customer needs the exact details
about the shipping as well as about the charges that are applicable while delivering the goods
to them. The good presentation and details are required along with the warranty.
2. The product should look credible and trustworthy: the professional design of the website
molds the customers to buy the product. The first impression of the user should last long. The
security badges, mailing address as well as the store rating can help the customers in such
cases (Bashir, 2013). The product should have the SSL certificate warning messages in order
to avoid the scares.
3. Display of the product on the homepage: there are some sites those who are not displaying
the specific study about the product like about the bestsellers, featured items, new arrivals
and much more. The main target of the home page is to look keep the customers interested
and also to win the click deeper into the site. Initially, the customers have no idea on the site,
so it is necessary to explore more about it, so the home page should look appealing in the
glance (Bilgihan, Kandampully & Zhang, 2016). Showing the products is not enough, the
way they design and merchandise the home page is more impactful.
4. Visual appealing: apart from looking trustworthy, the costumes also consider the look as
well as see the feel of the site. There are several ways to make the site more appealing in case
of the visual appearance.
5. Calculating the total cost: it is quite relevant and looks good when the online site shows the
taxes and shipping before checkout abandonment. Customers really appreciate these services
and so the site wins the warm-fuzzy points.
6. The search function should be easy: the most important thing about the e-commerce
business success is the search function of the product catalog. Every e-commerce site has the
search box, even among the famous brands. The web user should feel it comfortable with the
features and suggested items over the internet. The search result should be relevant and
reduce the errors to zero while searching for the products.

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
7. Privacy statement: the legalese can be overwhelming but the customers always look for the
privacy policies and statements over the internet. They are more concerned about the privacy
settings of the site.
8. Reviews of the customers: the reviews are the most popular approach to the online site to
reduce the risks of making a bad purchase and to show the trustworthy sellers over the
internet.
9. Links to the social networks: each site should have the link to the other social networks so
that it will be easy for a customer to buy the desired product and to hit the performance
records which will satisfy the needs of the customers and reduce their anxiety about the
product.
Differences and similarities of the product quality
There is a huge difference between the quality of the product when it is chosen over the web
and after the arrival of the product. When the customers are buying the products from the
various sites, they are focusing more on the quality. While purchasing, they see the design, its
material, the color texture, the quality of the product from the chart, check the desired size
and observe the patterns and design more precisely. But when the product arrives at the
customer, there are several manipulations and everything is changed (Blázquez, 2014).
The product that was chosen earlier by the customer is not the same one which has arrived at
them. The main thing that varies the most is the quality of the product. The quality highly
decreased and didn't satisfy the customer's taste. Due to this reason, the customers are highly
depressed from the online services (Chakraborty, et al., 2016). The color of the product
sometimes looks freckle and pale.
The original one looks more attractive and trendy, but the product that the customer receives
is far away from the original one which really looks old, untidy, tangled and bedraggled. The
services that are provided by them are not appreciated by the customers as there is a massive
difference between the chosen one and arrived one.
But, sometimes, the product that arrived at the customer looks exactly the same which was
earlier chosen by them. The quality, as well as the design, is same while touching them. The
customers feel excited to get the desired the product from the online shops. Initially, they feel

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
confused about the choice, whether they will get the desired one or not. But there are some
sites over the internet that clearly checks the customer's needs and provide them the desired
product in time (Chen, et al., 2015). The color texture, the quality, the design and the pattern
and even the size exactly match with that of the chosen one. The quality of the product is
highly appreciated by the customers as they look trendy, attractive, stylish and swanky.
The difference and similarities between the two cases are highly depended on the services
that are provided by the sellers of the online sites. They can provide the best services to the
customers otherwise they can do the reverse of it. The online products always need to update
as the choice and demand of the customers are changing with time and seasons. The sellers
from various sites should always check the latest choice of the customers with the help of the
search objectives (Dai, Forsythe & Kwon, 2014). They should provide the desired product to
the customer in time without compromising on the quality of the product.
The main target of every online site is to provide the best services to the customers so that
they will gain visit their website for further choices. The websites are maintained by the
backend developers so they exactly know what the customers are searching for. They are
updating the site in a regular interval of time just to attract the customers more towards them.
But all these things will make a worth sense when the delivery time comes (Hao Suan
Samuel, Balaji & Kok Wei, 2015). The delivered products should be the same one that was
ordered by the customer without doing any manipulation to it. So, various factors are
necessary to consider like the quality, the color texture, the design, the printed patterns and
mainly the longevity of the product.
Manage customer's perceptions and expectations of product quality
The perception and expectation of the customer are the two different parts of a pole.
Customers usually get attracted towards the product from a single glance. When they surf the
web, sometimes they find something more interesting and that strike their minds. This
happens due to the visualization of that particular product. The visualization is generally done
by the back-end developers, who recreate the image in a more appealing way for the
customers (Hasan, 2016).
Apart from the visualization, the brand awareness is the most important for a customer.
People believe that the branded products have the higher efficiency and longevity than the

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
readymade one. They are more attracted towards the branded products without giving a
second thought. The perception of the customers varies greatly with the brand and
visualization. As soon as they see the desired product, they started expecting a lot from it.
They need the best quality of product that will look trendy, alluring, fashionable and swanky
(Jiang, Yang & Jun, 2013). The online sellers are working hard to meet the perception as well
as the expectation of the customers in time. To meet the perception of the customers, they are
putting huge efforts on the design and visualization of the products over the web. And to
meet the expectation of the customers, they are providing the best services without
compromising on the quality of the product and also satisfying the need.
Considerably, the objectives of this research are:
1. The main objective of the research is to determine the online shopping biases that are
necessary to manage the relationship with the customers over the internet that is through
online.
2. Other important concepts under this study are to explore the quality of the product
considering the important fact that is the expectation of the customers.
3. The final research of this study is to adopt the main approaches that will increase the value
of the customer's satisfaction. The satisfaction of the customer is the main thing for the sellers
without compromising on the quality of the product (Katawetawaraks & Cheng, 2013).
Literature review
The buying process of the customers varies from one another. The decision process of the
consumer mainly depends on the five stages that starts from the problem recognition and
information search, evaluation of the various alternatives, decision-based on the purchase and
finally the post-purchase behavior of the consumer (Lin & Lekhawipat, 2014).
The problem recognition mainly starts from the perception of the needs and gradually moves
towards the information search where the customers generally use the external and internal
sources to study the information and the use that much information for analyzing the next
step of the evaluation of the alternatives (Ludin & Cheng, 2014). After the evaluation of the
alternatives for the customers, they move towards the purchase decision where they
encounter with several possibilities like from where to buy, when to buy or when not to and

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
much more. Once they made their choice, the purchase the product immediately, but the main
question which is important to check whether they are satisfied or not (Hsu, Chuang & Hsu,
2014).
The author Yu-Je Lee of "Exploring the Influence of Online Consumers' Perception on
Purchase Intention as Exemplified with an Online Bookstore" has explored the influence of
online store consumer's perception on their buying intention (Lee et al., 2009). He has used
the four relationship concepts between the perception of the online shopping and the purchase
intention of the consumer. The result of the survey which is based on the questionnaires
provides the necessary information about the product perception, experience on the shopping
as well as on the quality of the service which has the both negative and positive impacts.
The author Sultan & Uddin of "Consumers ‘Attitude towards online shopping" has described
the idea of running a business with huge technical changes. The technical changes are due to
the never-ending desires of the customers (Sultan & Uddin, 2011). According to the author,
the retailers are putting new strategies to meet the demands of the online shoppers. He has
studied the four factors that influence the attitude of the customer towards the online
shopping (Sultan & Uddin, 2011).. He has briefly explained the importance of the e-
commerce market, focused on the marketing methods and have properly mentioned the
coordination of various activities like the product development, information to the customers
about the product features, promotion, market research, customer feedback and much more.
The author Taweerat Jiradilok of "The Impact of Customer Satisfaction on Online
Purchasing: A Case Study Analysis in Thailand" has briefly explained the descriptive
research methods to satisfy and purchase intention of the online shoppers but have also
focused on the purchase intention and the factors that are most influential in motivating the
customers (Jiradilok et al., 2014). He has used the qualitative methods to properly frame the
conceptual methods that will differentiate the quality of the product.
Research methodology
The research methodology regarding the customer's attitude towards the online shopping is
one kind of descriptive research as it mainly shows the factors that influence the decision
process as well as the expectation of the customer to shop online. The quantitative approach
of the research is done in a precise way (Jiang, Yang & Jun, 2013). According to the reports,

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
time is the vital attribute for the entire decision-making process while selecting the research
methodologies. The quantitative methods are quite faster than the qualitative approaches in
terms of the duration. The descriptive research method is used to measure the involvement
level of the customers through structured questionnaires and the interview sample size taken
from the 100 respondents of the Australia (Katawetawaraks & Cheng, 2013).
The main objective of the entire process is to know the perception of the customers towards
the online shopping, to analyze the perception methods as well as to identify the behavior of
the customers towards the online shopping. The analysis process has included the both male
and female of certain age group and family (Lin & Lekhawipat, 2014). According to their
occupation and economic scale, various questions were provided that calculates the monthly
accessing rate of the customers on the internet (Ludin & Cheng, 2014).
Data collection
When the question comes to the data collection, there are generally two methods used named
as the primary and secondary methods. The primary methods include the questionnaire
section and the interview questions (Wu, 2013). The secondary data is one of those which are
collected by some other researcher not for the particular study or research purpose. The
primary data is the setup questionnaires from the consumers as what are the main factors that
influence the decision of the online purchase (Mallapragada, Chandukala & Liu, 2016). It is
quite easy to distribute the questions and to get the desired results out of it.
The respondents are geographically scattered in the Australia where the questionnaires are the
only choice for data collection and to understand the real facts of the online purchase. The
question is mainly based on the general topics like how much time do they spend on the web,
how they are making their decision when they first see the product over the internet, did the
online purchase affect their daily life, are they satisfied with the services of the online sellers
and much more (McLean & Wilson, 2015). Out of the 100 respondents, 90 percent of the
results were clear and relevant, but there are some results whose intentions were not clear, so
it was difficult to analyze their intention for the online shopping.
The questionnaires are quite helpful and relevant to analyze the intention and perception of
the customers towards the online shopping. According to various reports, the data collection
is considered as the best approach for several methods and process (Mohamed, et al., 2014).

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
The results that are obtained from the data collection are quite relevant and efficient for the
user to proceed further. The analysis methods don’t take more amounts of resources but it
only includes the true statement of the user that is based on their personal life and use. The
analysis here is mainly about the online purchase decision process of the customer which
needs the exact answers from the customers in order to maintain the record properly (O.
Pappas, et al., 2014).
Quantitative method
The Quantitative methods are the objective measurements and the statistical approaches,
mathematical or the numerical analysis of the various data collected through the surveys,
questionnaires, and manipulation methods as well as from the pre-existing data that were
used in the computational techniques (Pratminingsih, Lipuringtyas & Rimenta, 2013). The
Quantitative method mainly focuses on the numerical data and the generalization process
across the group of people or to explain a particular method and phenomenon. The main
target of conducting the study is to determine the relationship between the customer and the
online services.
The Quantitative method describes or designs the descriptive or the experimental methods
(Thakur & Srivastava, 2015). The descriptive method focuses on the association between the
variables whereas the experimental method describes the study of the casualties. The
Quantitative approaches of this case deal with the logic, numeric numbers as well as on the
objective. The process also focuses on the numeric and the unchanging data in a detailed
format (Wu & Huang, 2015). The aspects of the research were carefully studied and designed
before the data is collected. With the help of the various questionnaires, the numerical data
was analyzed properly. The results are mainly based on the larger sample sizes which are the
representative of the population. The overall study of the Quantitative method was to classify
the features, to construct the statistical methods and to count them.
Reference
Al-Debei, M. M., Akroush, M. N., & Ashouri, M. I. (2015). Consumer attitudes towards
online shopping: the effects of trust, perceived benefits, and perceived web
quality. Internet Research, 25(5), 707-733.

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
Anaza, N. A. (2014). Personality antecedents of customer citizenship behaviors in online
shopping situations. Psychology & Marketing, 31(4), 251-263.
Ashraf, A. R., Thongpapanl, N., & Auh, S. (2014). The application of the technology
acceptance model under different cultural contexts: The case of online shopping
adoption. Journal of International Marketing, 22(3), 68-93.
Bashir, A. (2013). Consumer Behavior towards online shopping of electronics in Pakistan.
Bilgihan, A., Kandampully, J., & Zhang, T. (2016). Towards a unified customer experience
in online shopping environments: Antecedents and outcomes. International Journal of
Quality and Service Sciences, 8(1), 102-119.
Blázquez, M. (2014). Fashion shopping in multichannel retail: The role of technology in
enhancing the customer experience. International Journal of Electronic
Commerce, 18(4), 97-116.
Chakraborty, R., Lee, J., Bagchi-Sen, S., Upadhyaya, S., & Rao, H. R. (2016). Online
shopping intention in the context of data breach in online retail stores: An examination
of older and younger adults. Decision Support Systems, 83, 47-56.
Chen, Y., Yan, X., Fan, W., & Gordon, M. (2015). The joint moderating role of trust
propensity and gender on consumers’ online shopping behavior. Computers in Human
Behavior, 43, 272-283.
Dai, B., Forsythe, S., & Kwon, W. S. (2014). The impact of online shopping experience on
risk perceptions and online purchase intentions: does product category matter?. Journal
of Electronic Commerce Research, 15(1), 13.
Hao Suan Samuel, L., Balaji, M. S., & Kok Wei, K. (2015). An investigation of online
shopping experience on trust and behavioral intentions. Journal of Internet
Commerce, 14(2), 233-254.

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
Hasan, B. (2016). Perceived irritation in online shopping: The impact of website design
characteristics. Computers in Human Behavior, 54, 224-230.
Hsu, M. H., Chuang, L. W., & Hsu, C. S. (2014). Understanding online shopping intention:
the roles of four types of trust and their antecedents. Internet Research, 24(3), 332-352.
Jiang, L., Yang, Z., & Jun, M. (2013). Measuring consumer perceptions of online shopping
convenience. Journal of Service Management, 24(2), 191-214.
Jiradilok, T., Malisuwan, S., Madan, N., & Sivaraks, J. (2014). The Impact of Customer
Satisfaction on online purchasing: a case study analysis in Thailand. Journal of
Economics, Business and Management, 2(1), 5-11.
Katawetawaraks, C., & Cheng, L. W. (2013). Online shopper behavior: Influences of online
shopping decision.
Lee, Y. J., Huang, C. L., Chang, L. Y., & Chen, C. Y. (2009). Exploring the Influence of
Online Consumers’ Perception on Purchase Intention as Exemplified with an Online
Bookstore. Journal of Global Business Management, 5(2).
Lin, C., & Lekhawipat, W. (2014). Factors affecting online repurchase intention. Industrial
Management & Data Systems, 114(4), 597-611.
Ludin, I. H. B. H., & Cheng, B. L. (2014). Factors influencing customer satisfaction and e-
loyalty: online shopping environment among the young adults. Management Dynamics
in the Knowledge Economy, 2(3), 462.
Mallapragada, G., Chandukala, S. R., & Liu, Q. (2016, March). Exploring the effects of
“What”(product) and “Where”(website) characteristics on online shopping behavior.
American Marketing Association.

BUSN20016 – Research in Business
McLean, G., & Wilson, A. (2015, June). An investigation on the online customer experience–
the role of social interaction. In The 14th International Research Symposium on Service
Excellence in Management.
Mohamed, N., Hussein, R., Hidayah Ahmad Zamzuri, N., & Haghshenas, H. (2014). Insights
into individual's online shopping continuance intention. Industrial Management & Data
Systems, 114(9), 1453-1476.
O. Pappas, I., G. Pateli, A., N. Giannakos, M., & Chrissikopoulos, V. (2014). Moderating
effects of online shopping experience on customer satisfaction and repurchase
intentions. International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, 42(3), 187-204.
Pratminingsih, S. A., Lipuringtyas, C., & Rimenta, T. (2013). Factors influencing customer
loyalty toward online shopping. International Journal of Trade, Economics and
Finance, 4(3), 104.
Sultan, M. U., & Uddin, N. (2011). Consumers’ Attitude towards Online Shopping (Doctoral
dissertation, Master Thesis in Business Administration. Gotland: University of
Högskolan på Gotland).
Thakur, R., & Srivastava, M. (2015). A study on the impact of consumer risk perception and
innovativeness on online shopping in India. International Journal of Retail &
Distribution Management, 43(2), 148-166.
Wu, I. L., & Huang, C. Y. (2015). Analysing complaint intentions in online shopping: the
antecedents of justice and technology use and the mediator of customer
satisfaction. Behaviour & Information Technology, 34(1), 69-80.
Wu, L. (2013). The antecedents of customer satisfaction and its link to complaint intentions
in online shopping: An integration of justice, technology, and trust. International
Journal of Information Management, 33(1), 166-176.