An Analysis of the Factors Affecting Online Purchasing Behavior of Pakistani Consumers

Abstract

The research reported in this thesis was on “An Analysis of the Factors Affecting Online Purchasing Behavior of Pakistani Consumers”. Despite the abundance of literature on buying behavior of online consumers, very little of it focuses on developing countries. The purpose of this research was to investigate the factors impacting the online purchasing patterns of consumers in the Pakistani market. The variables included in the proposed framework were perceived advantages, perceived risks, hedonic motivations, website design and lastly, psychological factors that included trust and security factors. The primary data was gathered by floating hundred questionnaires to online shoppers using convenience sampling. The secondary data was collected by consultation of published research papers, consumer reports, libraries and various internet sources. SPSS software was applied to analyze data for reliability and correlation. The results were then interpreted by usual principles of statistics. The findings indicated that perceived advantages, perceived risks and psychological factors were the significant variables. Perceived advantages and psychological factors had a positive impact on the consumer attitudes and buying behavior; however, perceived risks had a negative impact on consumer buying behavior. Website design and hedonic motivation were found out to be the insignificant variables. Psychological factors had the highest correlation with online shopping behavior, hence it was concluded that trust towards online vendors and security issues are the most important in determining online purchasing patterns of Pakistani consumers. Owing to rising inflation in Pakistan, people often resort to earningasy money through cybercrimes. Since fake e-stores, cybercrimes and scam websites are very common in Pakistan, people hesitate to shop online. Lack of accountability and the presence of con artists and vultures in the cyber world have resulted in unpleasant experiences of online Pakistani shoppers. Hence, e-tailors need toimprove the trust deficit in order to enhance purchase intention of current and potential consumers. The paper provides marketers with insights into how knowledge about the factors influencing purchasing patterns of online consumers can be incorporated into marketing strategies. The study suggests that in order to enhance the consumer purchase intentions, Pakistan’s online stores should build strategies to better address reliability and trustworthiness issues instead of merely focusing on website design, aesthetics and content factors.