An Empirical Research On Platform E-satisfaction

Platform online shopping is based on a third-party e-commerce platform. It owns a huge resource of buyers and sellers, promoting the generation of network groups and attracting a lot of cooperative institutions, such as banks, logistics, insurance, and IT enterprises. Third-party online retailers, cooperative organizations and network groups construct a completely open ecological system. Platform online shopping has become an important engine, which brings new opportunities of development for financial credit industry, IT services, logistics, and developing new industries, producing great economic benefits and social value. With the help of electronic information dissemination channels, platform online shopping breaks through the restrictions of space and time of traditional commercial activities, greatly reduces transaction cost, simplifies transaction processes, improves transaction efficiency, and increases trading opportunities. Great changes have taken place in shopping and consumption patterns since the introduction of platform online shopping. It drives the economic transformation and has brought great challenges to traditional commerce. This new shopping type has been accepted and used by consumers, and it is the main mode of electronic commerce in China.Customer satisfaction and loyalty is the core of electronic customer relationship management. Under the platform online shopping environment, lower entering and switching cost impel e-commerce enterprises to input more resources to obtain and keep users. Users are resources that e-commerce enterprises depend on for survival and loyal users is the precious wealth for all enterprises, but only satisfied users will be more likely to become loyal subscribers. Although platform online shopping develops fast, research on customer satisfaction in this field is rare. Therefore, it is necessary to construct theoretical model to systematically explain the development process of customer satisfaction in the environment of platform online shopping, so as to provide guidelines for enterprises to reasonably allocate resources and centralize superior strength to improve customers' relationship and increase users'loyalty.Under the environment of online shopping, consumers are not only buyers of goods and services, but they are also users of e-commerce platform. This paper is based on the dual identities of network users. From a multidisciplinary perspective, it systematically integrates research results of marketing and information system and develops a theoretical model of customer satisfaction in platform online shopping, which is based on the quality-value-satisfaction model and the technology acceptance model. This model extends the contents of traditional service quality and customer value. Based on characteristics of platform online shopping and analysis of the results of present research, it determines eTailQ and shopping value as service quality and perceived value of platform online shopping. Customer satisfaction model of platform online shopping completely specifies the relationships among different dimensions of eTailQ, ease of use, utilitarian value, hedonic value, satisfaction and loyalty and the moderate effects of transactional experience. This paper employed of sample survey as research design and the data was collected by a nationwide web-based survey. By using various statistical analysis tools, such as exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, structural equation analysis and multigrain analysis, it tests the constructs of the theoretical model and the causal relationships among them. Empirical findings support the direct impact of customer satisfaction on loyalty in platform online shopping, while website attributes, such as website design, fulfillment/security, customer service, ease of use, utilitarian value, and hedonic value, are key factors that influence satisfaction. Moderating effects of transitional experience on the impact of website design, fulfillment/security, ease of use, and utilitarian value on satisfaction and that of hedonic value on loyalty are also supported. These findings provide guidelines for e-commerce enterprises to generate strategies of improving customer relationships and retaining. The empirical results support positive influence of utilitarian value and hedonic value on loyalty. Website design, customer service and ease of use are factors influencing utilitarian value and hedonic value; however, fulfillment/security only affects utilitarian value. These results broaden and enrich the antecedent's research of shopping value, providing reference of value orientation for electronic commerce enterprises.This paper developed and tested the model of customer satisfaction of platform online shopping. Its findings are of reference value and significant meanings for online consumer behavioral research and marketing practice. Just like any scientific study, there exists limitation in this paper because of manpower shortage and time restriction. It is suggested that follow-up studies further improve and perfect this subject.