An Empirical Study on Preference of Consumers for Online Shopping – Indian Context

Abstract

In this digital era, the trend of online shopping has been widely accepted by the consumers but the question arises whether they are capable enough to face the challenges regarding online shopping. It is the duty of consumers to check the validity of the web portals before placing an order. Since some websites are fake and some have unauthentic payment gateways which may cause leakage of private/personal data and may create distrust among consumers towards online shopping. Sometimes the names of web portals have minor variations to disguise consumers for the intention of doing fraud. Some websites ask too much personal information and that’s why consumers hesitate to shop online. If websites are secured and there is no sniffing of information by the third party then consumers can rely on that website and it will create a positive image and trust. This paper is an attempt to analyzethe websites that are preferred most considering the factors such as: secured payment gateways, exchange offers, guarantee and warranty, sufficient product description and a better site speed. The study focuses on the authenticity of websites preferred by consumers while doing online shopping.