Consumers Online Information And Opinion Search Behaviors: A Research On The X And Y Generation Of Consumers

Abstract

The internet, which is an important source of information and opinions today, is a significant external information source that the consumers consult prior to their decisions to make purchases. Consumers' information and opinion search behaviors are influenced by many factors. One of these factors is the concept of generation that the individuals are inherently a member of. It is crucially important for the success of both offline and online companies to be aware of the online information and opinion search behavior of the X and Y generation consumers who are the most important internet users and shoppers of today. The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether there exist differences in online information and opinion search behaviors according to the generation of the respondents as consumers. For the main purpose, a questionnaire was designed from the literature review, and data were collected from the X and Y generations of consumers. Analyses of chi-square, factor analyses, and t-tests were conducted for hypotheses testing. The results of study show that three online information and opinion search behaviors are different by consumers' generation. These generation-based differences include avoiding risks, obtaining instant information and opinions and convenience in online information and opinion search. The main value of this paper is the empirical analyses of the consumers' online information and opinion search behaviors from X and Y generations perspective. As far as the relevant literature is concerned, the literature regarding online information search has come to emerge; however, there seems to be a gap in the literature whether there are differences on this subject from the perspectives of consumers in the X and Y generations. The present study aims to fill in this gap.