The factors that influence e-consumers´ behavior while making an online transaction

1. Introduction
2. Literature Review
4. Hypotheses
5. Methodology
6. Online Trust and
   Internet Fraud Questionnaire
7. Conclusions
8. Limitations
9. References

Introduction

The purpose of this research is to investigate the factors
that influence e-consumers´ behavior while making an online
transaction. Likewise, this study tries to estimate the impact
that swindling has over e-buyers quality"s decisions and trust.
Therefore, quality and trust become the key
variables or
subject of study of this research proposal.

Researchers such as Pavlou, Yousafzai, and Gefen have defined
trust as an important element affecting consumer behavior. They
also argued that online trust plays a key role in creating
satisfied and expected outcomes in online transactions; where
trust exists it increases consumers" beliefs that e-vendors will
not engage in opportunistic behavior (Chen and Barnes, 2007, pg.
22). On the other hand, e-commerce
quality is focused on aspects such as web design,
information searching, online ordering, delivery, payment, and
after-sales service (Su et al., 2006, pg. 362). In brief, it is
imperative for online retailers to identify what characteristics
influence e-customers before buying; but specifically, how these
factors are affecting the trust and quality perception of
potential customers.

This is an important topic to analyze because electronic
commerce is a growing market all around the world and reaches a
greater percentage of the population year after year. In fact,
online products and services have become an indispensable tool
for businesses and customers; therefore, it is imperative to
analyze the e-buyer purchasing behavior and understand what
motivates him, what makes him trust, and what his perception
about quality is.

Literature
Review

Nowadays, more scholars and researchers are accepting
consumers" perception of quality and trust as a subject worthy of
academic consideration in the e-commerce field. For example,
Allred (2006) has pointed out that it is obviously desirable for
online retailers to identify the attributes utilized by online
customers in their assessment of e-commerce quality (qtd. in Su
et al., 2008, 361). Chen and Barnes (2007) affirm that online
trust is one of the key obstacles to vendors succeeding on the
internet medium;
a lack of trust is likely to discourage online consumers from
participating in e-commerce (p. 21). In this regard, we assume
that e-commerce sellers should manage the customer"s trust
through trust-building activities, including identifying and
qualifying participants, and maintaining data such as reputation,
credit-worthiness, experience (Kim and Ahn, 2006, pg. 90), and
outcome quality (Su et al., 2008).

           
Consumer-perceived quality (CPQ), first defined by Grönroos
(1984), and further refined by Su, Li, Song, and Cheng (2008), is
the confirmation (or disconfirmation) of a consumer"s
expectations of service compared with the customer"s perception
of the service actually received (p. 360). E-quality is composed
by specific attributes or properties that differentiate one
e-business
from another one; consequently, the higher the e-quality the
higher the "social position" in the Web. However, companies that
participate in the e-business encounter several problems to
demonstrate and display quality through their Web sites; thus, a
fundamental question is, how can firms use online cues to
communicate that their abilities can be trusted? Marketers often
use observable signals (e.g., price, warranties, advertising
expenditures) to communicate the level of some unobservable
quality (e.g., product quality; Schlosser et al., 2006, pg. 135);
but, we will later explore in a deeper way the quality signals
that affect the behavior of a consumer online.

           
Trust has been defined as the willingness of a party to be
vulnerable to the actions of another party based on the
expectation that the order will perform a particular action
important to the trustor, irrespective of the ability to monitor or
control that
other party (Mayer et al., 1995, pg. 172). Based on this and
similar definitions, researchers such as McKnight and Chervany
have identified online trust as an important determinant for Web
sites to succeed in marketplace, and for retaining long-term
relationships with consumers (Chen and Barnes, 2007, pg. 21).
Several studies suggest that most internet users have serious
concerns about trust. Especially in the e-marketplace, where
buyers routinely engage with individual sellers with whom they
have little or no prior interaction, making trust one of the most
important issues to address (Kim and Ahn, 2006, pg. 84). Later in
this review, we will analyze the specific actions that influence
e-customers to trust.