Perception of Corporate Reputation in the Era of Digitization: Case Study of Online Shopping Behavior on Young Consumers

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic rapidly accelerated digitization in all fields of trading, especially in the B2C sector. The pandemic restrictions deepened the era of social distancing between young consumers and drew them further into the online environment, which allowed e-merchants to impress them even more, and with more ease, with the use of suitable online marketing communication. The overabundance of e-shops on the market may be very confusing for the consumer at this time, meaning that the corporate online reputation and its sustainability has never been as important as it is now. The investigation of online shopping consumer behavior and the factors that determine it is at the center of interest in both academic and practical spheres. In our study, we focused in more detail on investigating the relationship between the online shopping consumer behavior of young consumers and the perceived reputation of an e-shop in the era of digitization. The research sample consisted of 633 young consumer respondents. The method of exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was used in order to investigate the factors of online shopping consumer behavior, and the method of Ordinary Least Squared (OLS) model regression analysis was used to evaluate the relationships between individual factors and the perceived reputation of an e-shop. According to the results of EFA, four factors were identified: digital security, e-shop services, e-trust, and social responsibility and promotion. Subsequent testing confirmed the significant relationship between factors of online shopping consumer behavior and the perceived reputation of an e-shop in five cases.