Factors Affecting Online Purchase Intention: Effects of Technology and Social Commerce

Abstract

With the rapid development of information communication technologies and enhanced Internet penetration, the nature of a consumer’s daily activities has changed and most offline activities have migrated towards online activities. Moreover, customers have shown a greater tendency to shift to online activities from their traditional offline activities. In this light, e-commerce transactions in Sri Lanka are expected to grow in the near future. Apart from traditional Internet technologies, a variety of new social commerce activities has started influencing the behavior of customer activities including the online purchasing. Even though the impact of traditional Internet technologies on purchase intention of customers has been examined by many researchers, the same has not been examined adequately in relation to social commerce related activities. Therefore, this study is aimed at identifying the factors affecting online purchase intention of customers from both the technological and social commerce perspective. The theoretical model developed in the study was empirically tested through survey of 292 MBA students from two leading universities and a prominent institute in Sri Lanka. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was used to analyze the data. The study revealed that online purchase intention positively and significantly related with perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, website content and trust. Moreover, it was identified that trust has a full mediation effect between perceived ease of use and purchase intention as well as between website content and purchase intention. Further, it was found that trust has a partial mediation between perceived usefulness and purchase intention.