An Empirical Study of Online Shoppers’ Search Behaviour with Respect to Sources of Information in Northern India

Since the emergence of electronic retail in India, many new startups have mushroomed. These online retailers are competing for growth, existence and survival. Meeting the demands of prospective customers to offer them excellent product variety and service is important, but before making a purchase, today’s online shoppers make informed decisions. They gather, sort, analyze and act on the basis of information available to them. Therefore, it has become very critical for an online vendor to understand what source of information an online shopper refers before making final purchase. This paper deciphers the preferred sources of information of online shoppers in Northern India. It was found that, while searching for product information before shopping or buying products online, respondents mostly rely on search engines, review and company websites. Online retailer website, social networking sites, blogs and newspapers are not very popular source of information. Demographic analysis revealed that source of information has statistical significant relationship with demographic variables like city, age, occupation, family income, gender and marital status. Information in this paper will be useful for policy and decision makers in e-commerce businesses