Observational learning in the product configuration process: The effect of information presentation format

Yue WANG, D. Y. MO

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapters

Abstract

With the booming of ecommerce, online product configurators have been applied in various industries to elicit customer needs and transform them into product variants. To facilitate customers' choice navigation during configuration process, some configurators provide extra information about product, such as best seller options. Previous study shows that these kinds of information significantly affect consumer decision making process, a phenomenon often referred to as observational learning. This paper attempt to study the format of the information provided in configurators affects observational learning effect. Specifically, two kinds of information are investigated, namely, the best seller choice and customers' choice distribution among all the attribute alternatives. We empirically investigate how different kinds of factors affect customers choices when the best seller and choices distribution information are provided. Our experiment shows that motivation to customize the product is significant in customers' choices. While purchasing intention is significant only when best seller information is provided. We further notice that there is no much difference between people's choices when best seller and the choice distribution information are provided. Copyright © 2019 IEEE.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationProceedings of 2019 IEEE International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management, IEEM 2019
Place of PublicationUSA
PublisherIEEE
Pages1526-1530
ISBN (Electronic)9781728138046
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2019

Citation

Wang, Y., & Mo, D. Y. (2019). Observational learning in the product configuration process: The effect of information presentation format. In Proceedings of 2019 IEEE International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management, IEEM 2019 (pp. 1526-1530). IEEE. https://doi.org/10.1109/IEEM44572.2019.8978857

Keywords

  • E-commerce
  • Observational learning
  • Consumer behavior

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