Dimensions and Measurement of Amazon e-tail

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Final Introduction: Dimensions and Measurement of Amazon e-tail Provider

Dayrine Julianna de la Cruz Aquino

RIT

Academic Writing and Reading

Joshua Snyder

December 12, 2017

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Introduction

E-tail, as described by Downing (2013) refers to any commercial transaction sales

conducted on the Internet or web-based application. The purchase of products over online

platforms has attained a high number of customers due to the convenience of making

transactions without having to leave your house. One of the key elements of any type of service

provided is quality. As described by (Kenyon & Sen, 2014) Quality is how we describe the value

we perceive in the innate characteristics of a product or the attributes of a service.

Consumers perception of e-tail service quality has been studied in amplitude since

online sales made its entrance as a key element in modern commerce. (Janda, Throcchia &

Gwinner, 2002) assessed in their study the customer's perception regarding online shopping in

terms of performance of different aspects of the service. we can find studies that concern in the

need to have specific dimensions for internet and technology-based interactions, given that there

are existing and meaningful and important differences between online shopping and traditional

in-store channels (Parsuraman & Grewal, 2000). Maybe one of the most important differences

between these two types of commerce is that in-store retail most important dimension of quality

can be described as the human to human interaction and its characteristics, which we cannot have

while purchasing online.

It is important to have clear and measurable dimensions for online e-tail quality is

developed from the beginning to the end of the transaction, including information search,

website navigation, ordering, customer service interactions, delivery, satisfaction with the

ordered product and any other aspect of the interactions of the process with the customer. There

is increasing interest in better understanding the issue of online quality since dimensions with the
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consumer experience, expectations of online businesses are increasing (Kalia, Arora & Kumalo,

2016; Yoo & Donthu, 2001). While the analysis the behavior and perceptions of online shoppers

help to create a framework of the attributes that are important to consumers, it hardly addresses

the issue of conceptualizing whole aspects of the quality and the individual dimensions and its

interactions and relationships. As well, the validity and reliability have not been addressed

accordingly.

There is also a lack of cohesion among the scales for measuring the dimensions that have

more value to consumers. Some scales focus exclusively on the website interface, while others

attempt to measure the entire purchase experience. Researchers have developed attributes to

predict intention to return to the website (Rice, 2002), satisfaction with a website (Alpar, 2001)

and intentions to buy from the website (Loiacono, Watson, & Goodhue, 2002). Some researchers

focus only on etailing sites and on consumers while others include other types of sites not related

specifically to the purchase of goods.

Amazon.com, since its beginning 30 years ago, developed a fierce strategy too little by

little incorporate in their services any purchase of products customer could get in ant type of

store. It's no secret that right now Amazon.com is the most dominant force in online retail. What

is a surprise, however, is that year by year this etail provider goes beyond every forecast in sales

and market share gain. Recent data from Forbes that Amazon third quarter results report a 34%

increase in the revenues to 43.7 billion. Also, Amazon currently represents 53% of all of the

sales growth of online retailers in the U.S. last year.

As noted before online and offline environments present different shopping experiences

even when the same products can be purchased. Given the importance of consumers points of
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view and perceptions, a most important concern that must be addressed is the dimensions that are

defined as important to customers in assessing e-tail service quality. So, factors and dimension

for measuring service quality for in-retail cannot be used for e-tail. Most of the researchers based

on e-tail quality focus on singular factors like website design or portfolio of products through the

need to evaluate a current monster in e-tail like Amazon, to obtain current dimensions that make

online purchases satisfactory to customers.

The purpose of these mixed method study is to identify the more prominent online

service quality dimensions regarding Amazon’s service in base on United States consumers

perception. This with the drive to confirm the identified major service quality dimensions and

determine the relative importance of each identified service quality dimension in producing

overall service quality.

The research questions that this paper loos to respond to are following:

1. What are the of dimensions Amazon’s Service Quality?

2. What value do customers give to each dimension?

3. What are the most influential online service quality dimensions in achieving a high level

of overall service quality as perceived by online customers?

4. How can Amazon’s dimensions of quality be measured?

The answer to these questions would help obtained the needed dimensions and its

measurement for the etail quality for Amazon.com, that has proved to be needed in the

review of the literature.

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References

Alpar, P. (1999). Satisfaction with a Web Site: Its Measurement, Factors and Correlates. In M.

Nüttgens & A.-W. Scheer (Eds.), Electronic Business Engineering: 4.Internationale

Tagung Wirtschaftsinformatik 1999 (pp. 271-287). Heidelberg: Physica-Verlag HD.

Yoo, B., Donthu, N. (2001) Developing a scale to measure the perceived quality of an Internet

shopping site (SITEQUAL). Quarterly Journal of Electronic Commerce, 2(1), 31-46.

Downing D. (2013) Barron's business guides: Dictionary of computer and internet terms (11th

ed.). Hauppauge, NY: Barron's Educational Series.

Janda, S., Trocchia, P. J., & Gwinner, K. P. (2002). Consumer perceptions of internet retail

service quality. International Journal of Service Industry Management, 13(5), 412-431.

Kalia, P., Arora, R., & Kumalo, S. (2016). E-service quality, consumer satisfaction and future

purchase intentions in e-retail. E - Service Journal, 10(1), 24-41,66-67.

Kenyon, G. N., & Sen, K. C. (2015). What is Quality? In The Perception of Quality: Mapping

Product and Service Quality to Consumer Perceptions (pp. 1-4). London: Springer

London.

Loiacono, E. T., Watson, R. T., & Goodhue, D. L. (2002). WebQual: A measure of website

quality. American Marketing Association.Conference Proceedings, 13, 432. Retrieved

from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.rit.edu/docview/199486360?accountid=108

Rice, M. (2002) What makes users revisit a web site? Marketing News, 31 (6), 12.
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Parasuraman, A. and Grewal, D. (2000). The impact of technology on the quality-value-loyalty

chain: a research agenda. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 28(1), 168-74.