Portuguese online searching and buying behavior for personal lifestyle products and services

• Autor(a) principal: Cabrita, Inês Rubio
• Data de Publicação: 2012
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10071/5215
• topic: e-Commerce; Buying behavior; Searching behavior; Online marketing; Comportamento de compra; Comportamento de busca de informação; Marketing online

The Internet has revolutionized the way we communicate and relate with each other. E-commerce, has emerged as a naturally consequence of a new and exciting reality where everything can be accessed within the distance of a click. From products to services, or even ideas, all sorts of things can now be exchanged online. This online world, much different from the “real world” encompasses its specific characteristics, opportunities and challenges that represent an interesting, and at the same time complex, object of study. In the past few years, e-Commerce sales have been growing considerably, and Portugal has not distanced itself from this trend. However, despite the growing adoption of online commerce, very few studies have approached this subject taking into consideration the specificities of the Portuguese reality. Additionally, not only e-Commerce has its own determinants and defining elements, but also these elements change regarding the specific product category we are considering. Personal Lifestyle products, in this case, are directly associated with individual taste and preferences, in sum, with their lifestyle, and therefore represent a bigger challenge for online vendors, when satisfying its customer’s needs. This research consisted of an exploratory and quantitative study, combined with literature review on the topic online search and buying behavior, which allowed setting the ground for further statistical investigation.