Co-shopping and E-commerce: parent’s strategies for children’s purchase influence

Abstract

This paper serves to understand the influences of parents’ strategies on children’s e-commerce purchase influence via co-shopping and consumer socialization. As children are the original and perhaps most powerful online influencers understanding children’s influence is paramount to a successful e-commerce business. An exploratory qualitative study of 20 North American mothers with children between the ages 11–16 was conducted and data was analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Parents strategize children’s influence on e-commerce co-shopping through the techniques of promising, negotiating and educating and each approach has its own sub techniques such as wish lists, half and half purchasing and personal credit cards. This study shows the unique ways in which parents influence their children's e-commerce research and extends the findings on co-shopping from physical stores to the virtual arena. This study reveals valuable insights into how e-tailers can harness the influence of children on e-commerce purchases and mothers’ responses to them. This is the first study analyse parental strategies to children’s e-commerce purchases in the modern Internet arena.