Critical Success Factors in Online Retail--An Application of Quality Function Deployment and Interpretive Structural Modeling

Abstract

The retail infrastructure has witnessed a transformation with the rapid growth of electronic commerce, especially in the last two decades. E-business all over the world has become a popular medium for buyer-seller transaction as a means that complements and supplements the experiences of a physical store. Although the application of technology-based online retail services has grown rapidly in recent years, an understanding to attract, retain, and satisfy customers in such contexts remains limited. A marketer often encounters the difficulty of constituting a framework that could be used for constructing, managing, and evaluating its service delivery through the Internet. Based on a literature review, followed by an empirical study, this paper outlines the results of a study conducted to identify the critical success factors in online retailing. The literature review helped conceptualize the variables for the study. The Quality Function Deployment Technique was applied to identify performance indicators critical to success of online retailing. These were prioritized qualitatively through Interpretive structural modeling. Such an integrated framework of critical success factors would enable a better understanding of customers' needs and assist marketers while constructing, managing, and evaluating their online marketing strategies in the Indian context.