Determinants of Consumer Behavior

Below is an excerpt from my 2017 Ph.D. thesis about consumer behavior, online shopping process, and perception of privacy.

Ever since the dawn of the ancient ‘Sales Era’, the Peddlers scouted through villages selling basic consumables to their customers, and had to hone their talents to survive. The resulting art of sales, which includes psychology, showmanship and ingenuity has evolved over thousands of years of human life on earth.

ecommerce shopping cart buying cost effect engine marketing laptop pay paying power retailer sales services shop product retail price market sell business seller purchase computer b2b website trade web home b2c bargain search purple furniture floor flooring technology table desk — https://pxhere.com/en/photo/1440039

Fast forward to today, where the internet has made sales and marketing progressively easy (or is it?). But this ease give rise to fierce competition, as customers are bombarded with seemingly limitless options, all fighting for attention and the ever elusive sale.

The internet became a new state of presence and the vast online interactions are exponentially growing. This has created the need to understand how consumers perceive the world of e-commerce. The purpose of this dissertation was to identify the main determinant factors and explore the degree of their effect on the decision making process of the online consumer, as well as bring together disparate and yet interconnected elements of research and present an integrated model of e-consumer behavior. It has a secondary objective of stimulating more research in areas identified as still being under-explored.

At any given moment, millions of users are using the internet, and each one of them is a potential customer for any given e-business that offers its products or services online. The universe of information that is embodied by the internet is constantly growing, through millions of minds, incepting and creating content every second. This growth provides alluring opportunity for more e-businesses to flourish. But here lies our problem, this rapidly growing sea of choices, makes it harder for the customer to choose their needs and wants best fit, while also making the competition fierce for e-businesses.

Identifying and analyzing the factors that influence the consumers to choose shopping as opposed to traditional shopping, when they decide to buy a service or product online is crucial. The customer’s tastes, needs and demands are constantly changing, and that’s why we have to venture into the world of consumer behavior in order to better understand the influencers of the online consumer decision making process.

We cannot deny the fact that in our fast-paced world, information is becoming the most
important commodity. Whether you are at work or leisure, using your laptop/tablet,
smartphone, or in your car; chances are you are connected to the internet most of your
day, for precious information. The information may be business emails, conference
calls, research, shopping or even finding your way when you’re lost using electronic
maps in your car. The problem is, this flow of data is always two-way; when you are
using a specific online feature, one or all of the providers involved will gather different
information about you, with varying degrees of privacy. It can be as simple as your
name, or as drastic as your message contents or your location. Some providers will ask
for your permission to gather your information, while others will not. Certain companies nowadays make a business of trading this private information. We will not be exploring the legal details of privacy statements or their fallout, but we will be focusing on the different ways and degrees of online product/advert customization, in relation to e-privacy and its effect on consumer purchasing behavior.

My research further explores the relationship between consumer behavior, and perception, with the implications on their online privacy.

Beyond the boundaries of TIME

This is an excerpt from my first TEDx talk, where I explore my never-ending fascination with time itself…

Ever since the dawn of life on earth, the world has beheld the evolution of the relationship between living organisms and time itself. Today, we take time for granted, and use it as a simple unit of measure. But the nature of this relationship is quite complex and has been made progressively so throughout the different evolutionary eras.

Time is perceived by us in many different ways… Some philosophers contended that it does not even exist, some consider it a mere direction, is it merely an order of events of our lives as they fall from the future into present and past? The closest definition to my interpretation is Aristotle’s: “Time is the measure of change, but not change itself.”

First consider this; Earth’s geological age is 4.5 billion years, subdivided into eleven
geological eras, starting with Hadean Eon 4 billion years ago, ending with Cenozoic era
66 million years ago to present day.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geological_history_of_Earth#/media/File:Geologic_Clock_with_events_and_periods.svg

Whereas single-cell life 1500 million years, up to multicellular life 1000 million
years. Then “Land life” 400 million years, including dinosaurs 160 million years, finally
Homo Sapiens, only 160,000 years ago.

Now we can start to see the progressive nature of evolution. Let us consider the advancement of the quality of human life afterwards. First coal mining 1600, first industrial revolution 1870 (270 years), agricultural revolution 1770 to 1900 (130 years), second industrial revolution 1870-1905 (35 years). This last “Technological revolution” gave rise to modern inventions; telephone 1849; 56 years to; radio 1895 – 32 years to television 1927 – 28 years to microchip 1959 – 16 years to personal computer 1975 – 4 years to the internet 1978.