Machine learning technology is recently being applied to various fields. However, in the field of online consumer conversion, research is limited despite the high possibility of machine learning application due to the availability of big data. In this context, we investigate the following three research questions. First, what is the suitable machine learning model for predicting online consumer behavior? Second, what is the good data sampling method for predicting online con-sumer behavior? Third, can we interpret machine learning’s online consumer behavior prediction results? We analyze 374,749 online consumer behavior data from Google Merchandise Store, an online shopping mall, and explore research questions. As a result of the empirical analysis, the performance of the ensemble model eXtreme Gradient Boosting model is most suitable for pre-dicting purchase conversion of online consumers, and oversampling is the best method to mitigate data imbalance bias. In addition, by applying explainable artificial intelligence methods to the context of retargeting advertisements, we investigate which consumers are effective in retargeting advertisements. This study theoretically contributes to the marketing and machine learning lit-erature by exploring and answering the problems that arise when applying machine learning models to predicting online consumer conversion. It also contributes to the online advertising literature by exploring consumer characteristics that are effective for retargeting advertisements.

As the proportion of online shopping in the retail industry increases, studies on the effects of online shopping mall characteristics have been widely reported. However, limited research has been conducted on the effects of new website features in the Web2.0 environment and the factors that moderate these effects. This study analyzed these relationships through multilevel regression by measuring the features (e.g., decision aid, affiliate program, mobile app) of 390 online shopping malls and online shopping mall performance. The analysis showed that most website functions have a positive effect on online shopping malls, while the effect of product videos and affiliate programs differ by product involvement.