Cross Channel Consumer Behavior and its Benefits: Scale Validation to Assess Purchasing Process Performance/Comportamento do consumidor em canais cruzados e seus beneficios: validacao de escala para avaliar o desempenho do processo de compra/El comportamiento del consumidor en canales cruzados y sus beneficios: validacion de escala para evaluar el desempeno del proceso de compra.
| Autor | Porto, Rafael Barreiros |
1 Introduction
The existence of multiple purchasing channels is transforming the whole retail chain, most notably due to changes in consumer behavior. Standing out among these changes is the increase in Cross Channel Behavior--CCB --which refers to alternating between online and offline channels in a given purchasing process (Gensler, Verhoef, & Bohm, 2012; Gerritsen et. al., 2014). In this environment, one factor that contributes to the increase in this behavior is the expansion of consumer mobility, resulting from the ownership and use of mobile devices. This mobility has incentivized the simultaneous use of online and offline channels, leading to an increase in the use of search engines, an increase in price comparison websites, and enabling more sales conversions (Saad, 2013).
In the academic sphere, a wide range of theoretical or empirical studies on behaviors tangent to CCB have taken center stage in the last decade: the role of multichannel retail (Neslin & Shankar, 2009; Pauwels, Leeflang, Teerling, & Huizingh, 2011); Cross Channel strategies (Gerritsen et al., 2014; Trenz, 2015); the Omnichannel evolutionary concept (Frazer & Stiehler, 2014; Rigby, 2011; Valentini, Montaguti, & Neslin, 2011); and the adoption and spread of technology in retail (Bell, Choi, & Lodish, 2012).
Although recent studies have shown the relevance of purchasing process behavior in multiple online and offline channels (Flavian, Gurrea, & Orris, 2016; Gerritsen et. al., 2014; Trenz, 2015), there are few academic papers that have systematically developed a specific instrument for measuring CCB and its benefits for the consumer (Gerritsen et al., 2014; Trenz, 2015). The representation of this behavior using psychometric techniques can provide precision and standardization (Pasquali, 2007) for the purposes of understanding conduct that is ever more common in consumers: the adoption of new technologies for product and service purchasing processes coexisting with pre-existing technologies for the same end (Xu, Venkatesh, Tam, & Hong, 2010). However, a broader vision of the dimensions that compose CCB and the possible benefits of its adoption are spread throughout the literature. In addition, a theoretical model that contextualizes them is useful for explaining the possible result derived from research on its use.
This study aimed to develop and validate a scale of adoption of Cross Channel Behavior and its utilitarian/symbolic benefits combined with programmed positive/negative consequences to be delivered to the consumer. The use of this scale can detect the purchasing process performance generated by the frequency of adoption of CCB.
2 Cross Channel Behavior (CCB)
Some preliminary classification proposals have inserted CCB into the procedural stages of pre-purchase and effective purchase of a product, for example searching for product information in the online channel and carrying out the purchase in the offline channel (Gerritsen et. al., 2014; Zang, 2012). This occurs for various reasons, such as different pricing between the online and offline channels, the need to manipulate and try the product before choosing, the urgency with which the product is needed, and the unreliability concerning purchases made over the internet (Aghekyan-Simonian, Forsythe, Kwon, & Chattaraman, 2012; Trenz, 2015; Zhou & Piramuthu, 2010).
Bramall, Schoefer, and McKechnie (2004) had already observed evidence of internet use (online channel) solely to obtain information about products, with purchases occurring in the physical store (offline channel). However, the authors also observed the opposite and reported evidence of purchases carried out solely in the physical channel due to specificities of the product that made it difficult to sell through the online channel. Other studies have observed the completion of purchases in the channel that offers the lowest price, which often occurs in the online channel, despite shipping (Aghekyan-Simonian et al., 2012; Ling, Daud, Piew, Keoy, & Hassan, 2011; Lu & Su, 2009; Zang, 2012). In addition, Kim and Kim (2006) had already observed that the interaction between consumer and retailer/ manufacturer extends to the post-purchase stage and can use both channels, since the consumer can pay in the physical store and monitor the status of the order online, whether tracking the delivery of the product or using Customer Services for suggestions and/or complaints.
Thus, the purchasing behavioral process in crossed channels is broad, numerous, and multidimensional. By combining the pieces, dimensions can be listed, including simultaneous information searches regarding products, product/ price comparisons, and consumer interaction with the retailer/manufacturer, which can occur during the whole purchasing process, starting from pre-purchase and extending to post-purchase.
In a behavioral chain, simultaneous searches for information about products, product/price comparisons, and interactions with retailers/manufacturers can be considered as auxiliary precurrent behaviors not required by the purchasing situation (Oliveira-Castro & Campos, 2004; Pohl & Oliveira-Castro, 2008), since the consumer can in principle buy (current behavior) without any information search (precurrent behavior), buy without comparing products/ prices (precurrent behavior), and not interact with the retailer/manufacturer (precurrent behavior) in a given purchasing process. However, purchases are unlikely to occur without the consumer ever having carried out any of these precurrent behaviors. Precurrent behaviors are defined as responses that increase the frequency of other responses occurring, these being called current (e.g. the purchase of the product), or being reinforced (Oliveira-Castro, Faria, Dias, & Coelho, 2002). In this conception, CCB becomes a personal strategy to improve the achievement of a response (e.g. purchase) and/or the benefits related to the acquisition process. Consumers who adopt this behavior try to acquire the means to purchase more quickly, acquire better quality products, spend less financial resources and time, avoid the physical effort of displacement, minimize third party criticism, or maximize compliments from reference groups. In other words, it can lead to better performance in their purchases.
2.1 The simultaneous search for information (about products)
Searching for information about products can be an important consumer experience for generating pleasure derived from cognitive curiosity, as well as being able to improve consumer choices (Shin, 2009). Moon (2004) already indicated that in the decision-making process, the consumer can obtain information that is able to ensure better quality products and advantages in terms of price and range, and that can save time and increase convenience.
In addition, studies that have investigated consumption in the online channel have already indicated that the fun and entertainment in searching for products or in comparing products/ prices over the internet can generate a multi-sensorial experience in the process of purchasing products or services (Bridges & Flossheim, 2008; Hirschman & Holbrook, 1982; Overby & Lee, 2006), with or without the purchase actually being made.
Many researchers have studied the hedonistic behavior of searching for product information, which can be explained by a number of reasons: i) a pleasurable sensation derived from the imaginary use of products and objects seen and desired in stores and window displays (Campbell, 2001), ii) entertainment (Bridges & Florsheim, 2008), iii) the establishment of social and family bonds and ties (Raghunathan & Corfman, 2006), iv) the search for self-gratification, which refers to the pleasure and contentment derived from carrying out purchase experiences as a way of improving a momentary negative emotional state, whether as a form of distraction or to improve self esteem (Arnold & Reynolds, 2003); v) following market tendencies and innovations (Gursoy, Spangenberg, & Rutherford, 2006); vi) voyeurism, to contemplate people, products, environments, and objects (Holbrook, 2001).
From the CCB perspective, the search for information occurs simultaneously via the internet and in physical stores. It can be linked or not to the purchase actually being carried out (Ling et al., 2011), but it can also be linked to the way products are acquired (Moon, 2004). Consumers can search for product information in physical stores (offline channel) without the intention to acquire (O'Shaughnessy & O'Shaughnessy, 2007), look at window displays simply out of cognitive curiosity (Cheong & Park, 2005) or for fun or leisure (Kiseol, 2010), but they can also improve the quality of how they buy and what they buy, optimizing resources and time as a result of the information acquired (Moon, 2004).
2.2 Comparing products and prices
When comparing products and prices the consumer seeks to measure the price of alternative brands or promotional prices, payment of the purchase in installments, or discounts in any store where the product is sold (Srivastava & Chakravarti, 2011). However, individuals are not able to identify all the price possibilities of all products in all stores. There are obstacles to individuals when comparing, such as: time and cost constraints in the search and limitations in terms of intellectual capacity, perception, and the retention of information (Nagle, Hogan, & Zale, 2011).
The ease of buying products/services due to the democratization of the use of search engines and price comparison websites (Buscape, Bondfaro, Zoom.com) on the internet has been influenced by the popularization of the use of mobile devices (Bell et al., 2012). This discussion relates to the proposition that the choice of product composition tends to differ between the online and offline channels, since different pricings can result in comparatively different evaluations between consumers in different stores.
The behavior of comparing...
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