A study on A CUSTOMER ATTITUDE TOWARDS ONLINE SHOPING By

In Partial fulfillment of the requirements For the award of the degree of Master of Business Administration

Under the supervision of Mr. Sreekanth (Asst.Professor) Department of Management studies Institute of Aeronautical Engineering Dundigal (Village) Quthbullapur (Mandal),Hyderabad -500043

INDEX:CHAPTER 1

Introduction of topic.
1.1 Definitions. 1.2 Review of literature

CHAPTER 2 Objectives of the study

CHAPTER 3 Scope of the study

CHAPTER 4 Source of the data.

CHAPTER 5 Limitations

CHAPTER 6 Conclusion CHAPTER 7 Bibliography.

CHAPTER 1

Introduction to topic

In recent years, online shopping has become popular; however, it still caters to the middle and upper class. In order to shop online, one must be able to have access to a computer, a bank account and a debit card. Shopping has evolved with the growth of technology. According to research found in the Journal of Electronic Commerce, if one focuses on the demographic characteristics of the in-home shopper, in general, the higher the level of education, income, and occupation of the head of the household, the more favorable the perception of non-store shopping., Enrique.(2005) The Impact of Internet User Shopping Patterns and Demographics on Consumer Mobile Buying Behavior. Journal of Electronic Commerce Research, An influential factor in consumer attitude towards non-store shopping is exposure to technology, since it has been demonstrated that increased exposure to technology increases the probability of developing favorable attitudes towards new shopping channels. Online shopping widened the target audience to men and women of the middle class. At first, the main users of online shopping were young men with a high level of income and a university education. This profile is changing. For example, in USA in the early years of Internet there were very few women users, but by 2001 women were 52.8% of the online population. Online shoppers commonly use credit card to make payments, however some systems enable users to create accounts and pay by alternative means, such as:
y y y y y y y y y

Billing to mobile phones and landlines[3][4] Cash on delivery (C.O.D., offered by very few online stores) Check Debit card Direct debit in some countries Electronic money of various types Gift cards Postal money order Wire transfer/delivery on payment

Some sites will not accept international credit cards, some require both the purchaser's billing address and shipping address to be in the same country in which site does its business, and still other sites allow customers from anywhere to send gifts anywhere. The financial part of a transaction might be processed in real time (for example, letting

the consumer know their credit card was declined before they log off), or might be done later as part of the fulfillment process. The main idea of online shopping is not just in having a good looking website that could be listed in a lot of search engines or the art behind the site.[11] It also is not only just about disseminating information, because it is also about building relationships and making money.[11] Mostly, organizations try to adopt techniques of online shopping without understanding these techniques and/or without a sound business model.[11] Rather than supporting the organization's culture and brand name, the website should satisfy consumer's expectations.[11] A majority of consumers choose online shopping for a faster and more efficient shopping experience. Many researchers notify that the uniqueness of the web has dissolved and the need for the design, which will be user centered, is very important.[11] Companies should always remember that there are certain things, such as understanding the customer's wants and needs, living up to promises, never go out of style, because they give reason to come back. And the reason will stay if consumers always get what they expect. McDonaldization theory can be used in terms of online shopping, because online shopping is becoming more and more popular and a website that wants to gain more shoppers will use four major principles of McDonaldization: efficiency, calculability, predictability and control. Organizations, which want people to shop more online with them, should consume extensive amounts of time and money to define, design, develop, test, implement, and maintain the website. Also if a company wants their website to be popular among online shoppers it should leave the user with a positive impression about the organization, so consumers can get an impression that the company cares about them. The organization that wants to be accepted in online shopping needs to remember, that it is easier to lose a customer then to gain one. Lots of researchers state that even when a site was "top-rated", it would go nowhere if the organization failed to live up to common etiquette, such as returning e-mails in a timely fashion, notifying customers of problems, being honest, and being good stewards of the customers' data. Organizations that want to keep their customers or gain new ones should try to get rid of all mistakes and be more appealing to be more desirable for online shoppers. And this is why many designers of web shops consider research outcomes concerning consumer expectations. Research conducted by Elliot and Fowell (2000) revealed satisfactory and unsatisfactory customer experiences. One of the great benefits of online shopping is the ability to read others reviews, which could be from experts or simply fellow shoppers on one product and service.

The Nielsen Company conducted a survey in March 2010 and polled more than 27,000 Internet users in 55 markets from the Asia-Pacific, Europe, Middle East, North America and South America to look at questions such as How do consumers shop online?, What do they intend to buy?, How do they use various online shopping web pages?, and the impact of social media and other factors that come into play when consumers are trying to decide how to spend their money on which product or service. According to that research,[19] reviews on electronics (57%) such as DVD players, cell phones or PlayStations and so on, reviews on cars (45%), and reviews on software (37%) play an important role and have influence on consumers who tend to make purchases and buy online. In addition to online reviews, peer recommendations on the online shopping pages or social media play a key role for online shoppers while researching future purchases of electronics, cars and travel or concert bookings. On the other hand, according to the same research,[19] 40% of online shoppers indicate that they would not even buy electronics without consulting online reviews first. Online reviews play a fundamental role on consumers who want to buy some kind of product, but the biggest effect is seen for electronics, cars and software. DEFINATIONS ;Online shopping is the process whereby consumers directly buy goods or services from a seller in real-time, without an intermediary service, over the Internet. It is a form of electronic commerce. An online shop, eshop, e-store, internet shop, web shop, web store, online store, or virtual store evokes the physical analogy of buying products or services at a bricks-and-mortar retailer or in a shopping mall. The process is called Business-to-Consumer (B2C) online shopping. When a business buys from another business it is called Business-to-Business (B2B) online shopping.
The act of purchasing products or services over the Internet. Online shopping has grown in popularity over the years, mainly because people find it convenient and easy to bargain shop from the comfort of their home or office. One of the most enticing factor about online shopping, particularly during a holiday season, is it alleviates the need to wait in long lines or search from store to store for a particular item

online shopping: A process in which images or listings of goods and services are viewed remotely via electronic means, e.g., a vendor's Web site, items are selected for purchase, and the transaction is completed electronically with a credit card or an established credit account.

Literature review
Electronic commerce or ecommerce is a term for any type of business, or commercial transaction that involves the transfer of information across the Internet. It covers a range of different types of businesses, from consumer based retail sites, through auction or music sites, to business exchanges trading goods and services between corporations. Ecommerce allows consumers to electronically exchange goods and services with no barriers of time or distance. In the near future the boundaries between "conventional" and electronic" commerce will become increasingly blurred as more and more businesses move sections of their operations onto the Internet. Let us understand the origin of e-commerce. Commerce has evolved over the centuries. Prior to the evolution of money it was a simple barter process where things could be exchanged, say milk for grains. The evolution of money brought with it, the concept of a marketplace. In a marketplace, Commerce is function of 4 Ps Product, Price, Place and Promotions. All these four components play a vital role in a transaction to take place. Different combinations of 4Ps determine different forms of Commerce. Once the marketplace came into existence, a few pioneers realized that people would be ready to pay extra if they could deliver products at customers doorsteps. A slight modification on Price and Place led to the convenience of getting products at their homes. This concept delighted the customers and thus, the concept of Street Vendors was born. When the Postal System came into being the sellers decided to cash in on the new Opportunity and started using mailers giving description of their products. It led to the Concept of Mail Order Cataloguing. From here, the evolution of the Tele shopping A network was inevitable with the development of media vehicles. The latest generation of commerce is one that can be done over the internet. Internet provides a virtual platform Where sellers and buyers can come in contact for sale and purchase of goods and services. They can be thousands of miles apart, may belong to different parts of the world, might speak different languages, E-Commerce emerged as the boundary-less trade medium in the era of globalization. Distribution Channel has started to assume new meaning to the B2C and C2C eMarketer. The Physical delivery got converted to electronic delivery; physical products were now electronic products, displayed on a website. With options of paying online through debit and credit cards, even the transaction was purely electronic. Another important P for the e marketer, the Promotion, assumed importance, especially because there is no face to face interaction between the buyer and seller. The focus of online promotions is the great deals, discounts, convenience offered by the eMarketers.

CHAPTER 2

Objective of the study

yUnderstanding the consumer Ecommerce market in India yWhat factors determine whether internet users choose to buy/not buy certain products and how frequently they make these purchases? yExplore and compare the various factors associated with online buying behavior on the basis of customer

The complexities of modern life are changing the way consumers purchase goods today. The lack of time to spend searching around marketing areas, combined with the increased number of choices, as a result of market globalization, put considerable pressure on the consumer to make fast yet wise purchase decisions. Internet, and especially the World Wide Web, has opened the possibility of electronic commerce (e-shopping), allowing consumers to shop at any time from their own home, thus saving traveling time and in many cases the price comparison overhead. Searching or browsing an online catalogue can be much faster than walking through the aisles of a shopping mall. There are no geographical boundaries and products can be bought from almost any part of the world. However, e-shopping has certain limitations that for some people may become major barriers. There is an obvious need for computer equipment, a broadband Internet connection and some level of basic training for using online tools. Even for customers that are willing to try an online purchase, transaction security is a major concern. The need to provide personal information including credit card numbers prevents many traditional consumers from accepting online commerce. In addition, many people doubt the quality of products offered online, especially when coming from not well known sources. There is no way to try or test a product with on-line shopping, so customers can rely only on pictures, reviews, or word of mouth. For products such as clothes or shoes, a consumer can never be sure how they will fit on him/her. Furthermore, the enjoyment of spontaneous street shopping is lost. Many people enjoy shopping with others and it is often a good way to make social connections. On the other side of the equation, traditional shop owners and retailers are searching for mechanisms that will allow them to remain competitive against large merchants in todays high-speed very competitive business climate. They are interested in exploiting the potential to automate their internal procedures and promote their products to a wider audience. Especially small shop owners compete fiercely to attract customers to their stores. Thus, they seek intensively for a strong marketing

tool which will enable them to expose the characteristics of their products and services. There is a growing recognition that retail shops will not be able to survive if they fail to adapt continuously to the modern consumer needs and behaviors. Subsequently, shop owners are trying to understand how shopping patterns evolve and what features will be most attractive to the consumers of tomorrow. Forward thinking companies are already looking at the ways in which emerging technologies can contribute to future business success. It becomes then obvious that there is a need for a shopping system which will combine the advantages of traditional shopping and e-shopping to help consumers find what they need and save time. Such a system should be accessible any time from any place, easily handled even by computer novices, and ensure a high level of security and privacy management. In addition, it should enable shop owners to differentiate their products from competitors to maintain their stake in a rapidly evolving market. Mobile (m-) applications, and especially location-based services (LBS), offer the ideal environment for the development of such a service. Shopping, since it is considered both as an every-day activity and a leisure-time-activity, represents a key, largely untapped opportunity for the development of innovative, mobile, location-based services.

CHAPTER 3 Scope of study:

It was a time of past to spared your business in market by conventional methods. Old market is today converted in high tech markets. Today if you want to purchase any item from abroad you need not to go or you need not to call them for a sample. You can find their products and see the catalogue on internet. Internet enables you to shop throughout world from the comfort of your home. Internet has some special characteristics which no other medium have. Only internet can provide you such special information even no salesman can help you as internet helps. Countless people can see products at a single movement, as well as they can purchase the product same time. You can compare various product and choose which is more useful for you, You have the facility to visit websites as much as you like no restriction on you here you will find approximately all world class brands and their products you have the facility to compare them, arrange according to many types like by price, by size, by category, by most salable item and many more. This facility enables you to choose. This way of shopping provides a new way of shopping. You get to identify the products, compare the prices and quality and view the products from different angles. Testimonials and reviews are the unique feature of shopping where you can share your experiences with other users/consumers. The most exciting aspect of internet shopping is that it is a 24x7 affair! And you re free to shop on your leisure hours and even holiday are useful for shopping for you. Your time is best valued here. You need not to go market so no tension of conveyance, pollution, traffic etc.

The other dimension is that you directly purchase the items from original merchant in online shopping no mediator comes between you and merchant so it becomes cheaper to purchase item. Fewer mediators less price. Merchant will also save his money by selling of goods on internet. merchant need not to spent for staff, showroom, other shop expenses. He can sale by less resources and less expenses, some online store do not have their physical showroom they display their product and services online and deliver goods on customer 's door such merchant save a lot of expenses and they work in less capital thats why they are able to sale goods on low prices. Internet has a very bright future. If you want to increase your business and cross the boundaries of region you need to take help of internet. Without going online you cant think about your progress worldwide. In this regard you can see all large scale business. Big brand, big shopping store are online. Online shopping is the demand of today s modern time. Time and quality is the main subject of online shopping. Today everybody is running to save time and who saves time automatically save money. Day to day needed item is now available on internet and people prefer to shop online. Not only for progress but also to survive in this competition era business internet help.

The consumers can now buy the product they want from abroad with out going there. With the use of the internet the customers can see the description of the product on the companys website and place an order for the product. Internet enables you to shop throughout world from the home. The internet will explain about the product with the use of multimedia and the graphics, much better than what a sales man does. The customer can browse through the websites of the different companies and can compare the products with regard to price, size, category, most salable item and many more. Testimonials and reviews are the unique feature of online shopping where the customers can share their experiences with other consumers which is not at all possible in the traditional shopping. The another important application of the online shopping is that the consumers can do shopping 24/7. The other aspect of online shopping is that there is no mediator between the original merchant and the customer and the customers can directly purchase the items from original merchant. It saves money both for buyer as there is no mediator, the prices of the products are less and for the seller, as there is no physical store which saves many overhead costs and the building maintenance costs. The internet marketing also helps for the local producers to enter in to the global markets at less investments. Time and quality are the main objectives of online shopping and internet helps a business not only to progress but also to survive in this competition era.

CHAPTER 4

Sources of data:

Hey Everyone, On Sunday I was contacted by a client and they said the needed a shopping cart up by Monday. Since they needed this cart up so fast I went to the easiest solution I knew, Open Source Shopping Carts. I browsed through tons of shopping carts compatible with the best ecommerce hosting and put together a list of only the best carts. The list is below.

is robust, professional grade e-Commerce shopping cart that you can download, install, and use for free. In the back end, you will use a full featured back end to manage your inventory, orders, shipping, and customers in real time. Your customer s payments are sent directly to your commercial bank account using the latest security technology. You can even add your own modules to the shopping cart.

is an open source PHP based online shopping cart system. OpenCart is easy to use and is SEO optimized with a very nice interface. A great feature of OpenCart is that customers can write their own reviews of the products.

is a professional open-source e-Commerce solution offering unprecedented flexibility and control. Magneto is awesome, I would never believe it is an opensource project. It features clean urls and SEO from the start. Everything is designed in a clean and simple way. Magneto also features: Unlimited flexibility, Completely Scalable Architecture, Professional and Community Support, and Smooth Integration with 3rd party apps.

is very popular shopping cart. Cube Cart V3 is free, with the exception that you leave their copyright notice in your footer. Cube Cart has a large amount of payment gateways and shipping gateways. Their support forums are lively and many people contribute plug-in to the cart. To use Cube Cart V4 you must pay but it has many features that V3 doesn t have.

is another very popular online shopping cart, written in Perl/MySQL. It features a css manager so you can edit the look of your cart online.

Agora Cart also features unlimited product options, up to 4 different tax zones at the same time, tons of shipping and payment gateways/options. The setup options range from a simple template based store to the integration of a complex visual design and support for program modification.

is a free, user friendly, open source shopping cart. Zen Cart focuses on the merchants and shoppers instead of the developers. Zen Cart also supports multiple payment and shipping options, quantity discounts and coupons. Also Zen Cart is very easy to install.

is an online shopping cart that offers a wide range of features that allows online stores to be setup fairly quickly. osCommerce is backed by a great and active community. It also supports multiple currencies, allows customers to print invoices from the order screen, and has an easy database backup system.

is a powerful, free PHP/MySQL shopping cart system that is easy to install and customize. The Cart is free but it does have copyright notices that you can pay to get rid of. Store Sprite has many features including automatic tax calculation; automatic delivery cost calculations, customer ratings and reviews and featured products.

CHAPTER 5
Limitation

E-commerce is the most efficient method of making online transactions. Be it stock trade, buying and selling or exchanging vital information, the e-commerce tool saves cost and time. While the benefits are many, people are also concerned over the limitations of e-commerce solutions. It is true that shopping online has been made easy today. One doesnt need to go all the way to the market to purchase clothes and dresses, electronic accessories, groceries or even sports goods and many other products associated with online marketing. These transactions of goods, making online payments and making money transfers from one account to another raises a lot of concerns of safety standards. The main reason is that an expert hacker can easily track account transactions and steal credit card codes or even ATM pin numbers. Some sites which offer genuine services act as scam. So, the first and basic limitation of e-commerce is technical limitation. There is a lack of security in this system along with reliability. The standards of security cannot be completely trusted and the communication protocol is also according to some a little bit not up to the mark. There is insufficient telecommunication bandwidth. This is mostly needed for B2C clients where large number of business transactions needs to take place and the lack of bandwidth usually slows down the complete process of work. Major tasks suffer backlog when huge amount of information is not able to pass through minimum bandwidth and this also extends the time of work. The next limitation is that software tools are constantly evolving. This means you need to keep on making constant changes to your website and e-business modules. You may also have to bring new improvisations and business presentations to keep track of time. Nature of online advertisement banners may have to be evolved according to the new changes in web browsers and graphics and animations. Digital and non-digital sales and production information needs to be integrated and this doesnt become easy when using the e-commerce medium. The different internet mediums like cable, dialup, ISDN and wireless have their own access limitations. They dont always work efficiently and they have their own bandwidth restrictions. Different internet providers come up with different package plans which sometimes work to the disadvantage of the consumer and retailer. There are high-speed internet service providers but these are only affordable by the rich in

most countries which means a low-scale business operator or consumer will have to compromise with lesser speed for access of any information or transaction. Some of the browsers dont display advertisements as they dont have special standards of software. This means vendors will not be able to reach out to the global audience in a uniform manner. There is great amount of difficulty in integrating the infrastructure of e-commerce with IT systems currently. Apart from this, there are many other non-technical limitations as we will look into them. As mentioned earlier, most consumers dont feel secure about the online transaction of money. The trust factor is very low when coming to the faceless seller whom they have never met before. There is always an element of risk that customer information can be misused. There are too many websites which give out personal details of e-mail records and other contact information. There are conflicting laws between different countries and differences of languages pose a huge problem. The difference of cultures also does not make the understanding easy across borders. There are many concerns raised over these issues by both businessmen and consumers. Apart from all of these limitations, there is a resistance from people to change and trust the internet medium of transaction.

CHAPTER 6
Conclusion:-

The research was performed to understand the differences in male and female online shoppers if any. The research did throw up some interesting findings which showed that though male and female shoppers were different in some aspects there were similarities too in their buying behavior. The research did show that men were the more frequent buyers online and had been using the internet for a longer period of time, but there were a few surprises like the percentage of women who continued to buy online after they had bought something once online was more than the corresponding percentage of males for the same scenario. Though men generally were more comfortable in buying products and services online ; there were a few cases where women were more comfortable buying on the net and were even willing to spend more than men online like in the case of buying services related to travel and buying books online. The main motivations for buying online for both sexes were similar though the main barrier to shopping online were a bit different and the love women had for buying products offline and going out to shop was a barrier to online purchases. Thus to attract first time female online shoppers a way has to be found to make online shopping more interactive and involving and further research is needed to find out how to reduce the gap between online and offline shopping for women. A larger number of female respondents faced problems while buying online and maybe the navigation through ecommerce sites could be made simpler to help these buyers. The female respondents were more apprehensive generally than males and did not think offers in many categories were credible. The categories men and women less apprehensive about were starkly different and thus the marketers need to handle these shoppers differently. On understanding the perceptions of respondents on who was more comfortable in buying what products online a few interesting facts were revealed.

Their perceptions of who bought what product/services online were similar. For both male and female respondents friends were biggest influencers while buying majority of products online. Men were more comfortable in spending in the higher price brackets. Thus there are differences that exist in online male and female buying and in certain cases the targeting strategies should be segregated. There is a need to inform the female shoppers online and to create credibility of online ecommerce sites among them. There is a scope for further research to understand the attitudes and psychographics of male and female online shoppers. A need is there to understand psychological reasons behind the differences in male and female shoppers online.
Further, if businesses were to provide some clear exchange or refund policy to minimize the perceived risk in purchasing, consumers would be enticed to try online

shopping. Competent sales support staV that can handle customers enquiries and complaints promptly will add credibility to online businesses. Credibility is extremely important since people buy from online businesses mainly on the basis of what is stated on their websites. It is especially important for businesses to build up a brand name in the initial stage of the innovation period as this would help protect market share later when more companies have joined the e-commerce business. Website designers can also design a frequently asked questions (FAQ) section to provide rapid answers to frequently asked questions, including information about the security of consumers transactions, company return, payment and credit policies, shipping and handling costs, guarantees and statements about product quality. In addition, online businesses can increase consumers condense by including telephone and fax numbers and email addresses in their website so that consumers can easily communicate with them. Since search engines are the main source of information on websites (see table 4b), online businesses must index their websites correctly as this will help customers to nd them easily. Web designers can also manipulate the content of their web pages to procure top placement in the results of search engine queries. Besides using search engines, online shoppers also seek information on websites from publications (see table 3c). Hence, it makes sense to supplement Web advertising with traditional advertising The results also show that Internet usage in Singapore is most prevalent among ages 20 24 years. Businesses should consider providing customized advertisements to target this potential group and organize their marketing campaigns around the characteristics of the desired target group. They could sell septic products of interest to them, such as leisure products like movies, compact discs and travel to best capture their attention, arouse their interest, meet their needs and, ultimately, close the sale. Web designers should periodically gather feedback via surveys on consumers satisfaction with products and services so that revisions and improvements can be made to the Internet channel. The key for Web designers will be the continued willingness to innovate while maintaining a clear focus on what delivers value to customers. These implications could be important for businesses intending to set up web pages on the Internet. Finally, businesses should note that despite the above eVorts to encourage online shopping, the Internet is only one of the possible channels for retailing and that not all consumers are likely to embrace online shopping. The managerial problem is to integrate the Internet into overall channel management so that those consumers who like the Internet can use it, while those who dont like the Internet can resort to other channels or just use the Internet to gather information rather than for online shopping.

CHAPTER 7
Biblography

REFERENCE: y y Journal of Electronic Commerce Research, VOL. 6, NO.2, 2005 Teo, T. S. H., 2001. Demographics and Motivation Variables Associated with Internet Usage Activities. Internet Research: Electronic Networking Applications and Policy, 11(2), 125-137. GVU., 2000. Graphics, Visualization, & Usability Center's 10th World Wide Web Survey, [[Online]]. Available from: http://www.gvu.gatech/user_surveys/, accessed 15 May 2002.

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