Online shopping

Consumer needs and expectations

Internet consumers are self-conscious and emphasize personalized consumption, which makes the demand for online consumption different. Online consumers have different needs depending on their time and environment. Even different online consumers have different needs at the same level of demand due to the difference in income level and other factors. Compared with the centralized nature of traditional markets, online consumption is more decentralized. In the online consumer market, consumers have a short decision time, a large variability of consumer demand, a large number of purchases, but a relatively small amount of each purchase, a considerable mobility of purchases, a strong substitutability of goods, and a large elasticity of demand.^[45] According to the output of a research report by Western Michigan University published in 2005, an e-commerce website does not have to be good looking with listing on a lot of search engines. It must build relationships with customers to make money. The report also suggests that a website must leave a positive impression on the customers, giving them a reason to come back.^[46] However, resent research^[47] has proven that sites with higher focus on efficiency, convenience, and personalised services increased the customers motivation to make purchases.
Dyn, an Internet performance management company conducted a survey on more than 1400 consumers across 11 countries in North America, Europe, Middle-East and Asia and the results of the survey are as follows:

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  Online retailers must improve the website speed
  
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  Online retailers must ease consumers fear around security
  

These concerns majorly affect the decisions of almost two thirds of the consumers.^[48]

User interface

An automated online assistant, with potential to enhance user interface on shopping sites.

The most important factors determining whether customers return to a website are ease of use and the presence of user-friendly features.^[49] Usability testing is important for finding problems and improvements in a web site. Methods for evaluating usability include heuristic evaluation, cognitive walkthrough, and user testing. Each technique has its own characteristics and emphasizes different aspects of the user experience.^[49]