Banking Academy of Vietnam

International School of Business

A STUDY
on
ITP STUDENTS’ ONLINE SHOPPING
BEHAVIORS

Name: Nguyen Khanh Vy

Student’s ID: F11095
Class: F11D
Lecturer: Ms. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Bich
Mark:

Hanoi – 2018
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 1

A Study on ITP Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors

by
Nguyen Khanh Vy _ F11095

Subject: Project (Term II)

Lecturer: Ms. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Bich
Class: F11D
Mark:
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 2

Abstract
Online commerce has gained significant popularity around the world, creating concerns and
interests among Vietnamese in particular. The purpose of this paper is to explore the online
shopping behaviors of university students from International Trading Program (ITP) in
Vietnam, in terms of the degree of popularity of online shopping and the decisive factors
related to purchase and repurchase intention. A survey in the form of questionnaire was
conducted, which included 150 randomly selected participants. Paper questionnaires were
handed out to participants with twelve questions, and then categorized based on the
backgrounds into two groups: Hanoi and other areas students. The results demonstrate that
both survey groups are familiar with making online purchases but on a quite low level of
frequency. Also, when finding the suitable websites, the respondents mostly concentrated on
promotions and sales and products characteristics including quality and price. Furthermore,
shipping and customer service, aside from products aspect, can decide whether the purchase
will be made. It is also indicated that products quality and price are the two factors affecting
repurchase intentions of the participants. For the significance of the paper, these findings not
only develop a sophisticated understanding of the habits of the subjects when conducting a
purchase but they also offer useful knowledge to those involved in the online shopping
industry whose targeted consumers are university students.
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 3

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Abstract......................................................................................................................................2

List of Figures............................................................................................................................4

1. Introduction.....................................................................................................................5

2. Method............................................................................................................................6

3. Findings/ Results.............................................................................................................6

4. Discussion of findings.....................................................................................................9

4.1. The degree of popularity.............................................................................................9

4.2. The motivating factors to purchase...........................................................................10

4.3. The decisive factors to repurchase.............................................................................11

5. Recommendations.........................................................................................................11

6. Conclusion.....................................................................................................................11

References................................................................................................................................13

Appendices...............................................................................................................................14
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 4

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Students’ having made online purchases....................................................................7
Figure 2: Students’ shopping online frequency..........................................................................7
Figure 3: Most concerning factors when choosing an online website.......................................8
Figure 4: Most decisive factors whether to make an online purchase.......................................8
Figure 5: Students’ motivating factors to repurchase.................................................................9
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 5

1. Introduction

Electronic commerce or what often called e-commerce – defined as the application of

“electronic means and technologies to conduct commerce” (Manzoor, 2010) – has been
drawing attention of the public due to its tremendous benefits and perks, including the ability
to enhance an existing market position and to provide firms and companies a way of product
distribution with low cost and high efficiency. Online commerce, as a result, has been
experiencing its remarkable growth in popularity, in which internet purchases has been
holding its position as the fastest growing segment. An annual survey which is in its fifth year
involving “5000 consumers” who conduct a minimum of two online purchases over a
duration of three months, find that currently the proportion is that “51%” of the spending was
online, which was 3% and 4% higher than the results of 2015 and 2014 respectively (Stevens,
2016). This online shopping explosion has created new concerns and interests in the subject
among the Vietnamese in particular.

It is due to the growing demand for commodities and services, along with the accessibility
and availability of technology and information in this digital that the number of online
shoppers, in general, has augmented significantly. Among numerous consumers from
different age groups, there is a large segment held by university students, who are the most
likely to accept and get access to new approaches and ideas while having a source of income
to make a purchase on their own, both in large and small scale. However, very little is known
about the degree of popularity and how this particular age group decides whether to purchase
a product or service, as well as their post-purchased intentions.

Unfortunately, there has not been much research conducted to investigate these subjects.
While there have been numerous investigations that are carried out, nevertheless the results
achieved are mostly able to reflect one part of the subject. A previous research suggested that
physical stores are lost to online retailers when it comes to customers’ choice in shopping
models (Shanthi and Kannaiah, 2015). It is believed that consumers’ decisions were based on
convenience in five dimensions, including access, search, evaluation, transaction and
possession convenience (Jiang, Yang and Jun, 2013). In addition, there is a discrepancy
existing between the figures for the website access and the actual purchases (Changchit,
2006; Shim et al., 2001).

Despite their promising outcomes, these studies had some limitations since they had not yet
been able to connect and find the relationship among the frequency of internet purchases,
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 6

motivating factors and the repurchase intention of consumers as university students,

especially those in ITP where I am currently studying. Therefore, this study is conducted to
answer the three following questions: “What is the degree of popularity of online shopping
among ITP university students?”; “What are the motivating factors to consider when
university ITP students make an online purchase?” and “What are the key elements that can
affect their intention to repurchase online products?” Furthermore, there would be highlights
of the online purchase made by local and boarding students and suggestions in increasing the
frequency in meeting demands of the targeted consumers.

2. Method
This study provides information obtained from a survey conducted within International
Trading Program of Banking Academy. In the initial step, 150 ITP university students – both
local and boarding ones - of different academic years will be randomly chosen as our subjects
to fill in a questionnaire designed in regard to my three research questions. Paper
questionnaires will be used where participants will be required to answer twelve questions
including eight multiple-choice questions, two ranking questions and two graphic questions.
The survey will be divided into two main sections. First, two questions will be asked to
acquire basic information of respondents. Afterwards, the questionnaire will be broken into
two smaller parts for those who have already made an online purchase and those who have
not. All responses will be documented, so the data can be reused for later research. While
successfully capturing the attention of the subjects with the combination of various question
types, this approach, in addition, brings participants the feelings of being higher appreciated
and more involved compared to conventional separated ones. Therefore, the acquired data
can be considered to be genuine and trustworthy.
3. Findings/ Results

The participants of the project were classified according to their background information into
two groups: 101 students from Hanoi and 49 from others. As expected, the results
successfully reflect the similarities and differences between two groups regarding their
perspective and behavior towards online shopping.
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 7

Figure 1: Students’ having made online purchases

12.87% 16.33%

Yes
No

87.13% 83.67%

1.1: Hanoi 1.2: Others

As shown in Figure 1, both students from Hanoi and other areas used to make an online
purchase before with approximately the same figures, which were 87% for the former and
84% for the latter.

Figure 2: Students’ shopping online frequency

6.82% 2.44%
19.32% 12.20% 19.51%
15.91%
Hardly Ever
1-4 times a
month
5-12 times a
month
More than 12
57.95% 65.85% times a month

2.1: Hanoi 2.2: Others

In terms of frequency, the majority of both groups went shopping online 1-4 times a month,
with 58% and 66% for the local and boarding students respectively. Meanwhile, the figures
for students making online purchase more than 12 times a month were the least in both
groups (7% of Hanoi students and 2% of others).
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 8

Figure 3: Most concerning factors when choosing an online website

60 56.1
51.2 50 50
50 47.7
43.2 43.9
40 34.1
30 26.1
20
9.8 Hanoi
10
Others
0

It is also noticeable that when it comes to choosing an online website, promotions and sales
received the most attention from boarding participants comparing to the four remaining
factors, with 56.1%, whilst the highest figures for Hanoi consumers went to not only
recommendations but also fame and prestige which were selected by exactly half of the
respondents.

Figure 4: Most decisive factors whether to make an online purchase

 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 9

100%
90%
27
80% Others
47 48
70% 6
Shippin
60% g
26 Factors
50%
12
40% Product
41 30
s Price
30%
30
20% Product
s
10% 20
Quality
11
0% 2
First Second Third

100% 2
90% 18 22
24
80%
Others
70% 24
24
60% Custome
r Service
50% 49 17
40% 24
Products
41
Price
30%
30
20% 25 Products
10% Quality

0%
First Second Third
4.1: Hanoi 4.2: Others

Interestingly, in Figure 4, the local and boarding students did not share the same opinions on
the three crucial factors when deciding whether to make a purchase. Both considered
products quality and price as two of the factors in question, while the third was shipping
factors for the local and customer service for the boarding ones.
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 10

Figure 5: Students’ motivating factors to repurchase

80
72
70
60
50
50 46
42 44
40
30 32
30 24 26
22
20 Hanoi
10 Others

Looking at the details provided in Figure 5, products quality ranked first as the decisive
factors to repurchase products for both consumers in Hanoi and other areas, with a significant
72% and 46%, respectively.

4. Discussion of findings
The project, similar to other research, is not without its limitation on the subject of the
inability to answer the questions from all perspectives of university students upon online
shopping. The obtained figures were collected in a relatively limited scope as the participants
came in a particular group from a single university. However, the research still managed to
make generalizations from obtained data thanks to the diversity of perceptions of students
having different social backgrounds.
4.1. The degree of popularity
The results presented in Figure 1, page 7, show that students from Hanoi and other areas
share similar proportion of online buyers and non-buyers, in which the majority have at least
gone shopping online once. This is highly likely the result of the advances on technology and
the Internet that contribute to a transition from offline to online interactions of university
students, who tend to be active online on social media regardless of their backgrounds. Being
exposed to a large amount of information related to e-commerce on a regular basis, they may
find it effective as an alternative way of shopping owing to its strengths which will be
discussed below.
However, unexpectedly, not only did two groups experience a similarity in the former
discussed issue but also in the figures for online shopping frequency, in which the largest
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 11

segments of two surveyed subjects group both went to the 1-4 times a month group, not the 5-
12 times a month one. This might be attributable to the lack of trust in online stores as there
are a variety of risks they may have to deal with when shopping online, including false
advertisement, identity theft or lost products in shipping process, that they try to limit their
times purchasing online to the minimum. Apparently, beside the positive aspect of online
shopping that the majority take advantage of, it is also known for the potential risks that
prevent these buyers from making more purchases online.
4.2. The motivating factors to purchase
The answers for what the most concerning factors when choosing an online websites is
indicate that, among ITP boarding students, promotions and sales earn highest attention,
meanwhile, their local peers pay equal attention to promotions/ sales and fame/ prestige of
the websites. One possible explanation for this preference is that since university students do
not have many sources of income and only have a limited budget to spend for many of their
personal purposes, they pay their attention the most to promotions and sales as a way to buy
the products at more reasonable prices, and for the local particularly, they may find the
websites more trustworthy if it has gained quite positive reviews from customers.
Additionally, both surveyed groups agree that web layout did not concern them much as it
had the lowest percentage, which can be understandable because the website layout does not
cause many differences to the actual products quality and price or the service customers are
offered on the website. Users, therefore, are unlikely to put the decoration and how a website
is presented on the top factors to consider when it comes to website choice.
The question related to top three factors affecting their decision of making an online
purchase, on the opposite, raise a discrepancy between students from Hanoi and other areas
as aside from the two same factors, namely products quality and price, the local ones opt for
shipping issues like time and fee as the third element, while the counterpart think customer
service is more important. This may pose a question of whether the quality of shipping
services in inner-city area is as adequate and satisfactory as in the outer-city areas.
4.3. The decisive factors to repurchase

Another aspect that the project covered, the motivating factors if they decide to make their
following purchases, has its results presented in Figure 5, page 9. Both subjects groups have
their first consideration as the products quality, which can be explained by the apparent
negative effects it brings by the bad-quality products. Besides, while the figures for the
remaining factors between two groups shared quite similar percentage, there was a
considerable difference in that of products price between two groups, with a half of the
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 12

respondents from Hanoi and a quarter of the others. Both can be seen as a result of the feeling
of satisfaction when purchasing for a high-quality product at corresponding price.

5. Recommendations

From the above discussion of findings, there are several following recommendations that
should be put into consideration. The first is that as online shopping has already been
growing in popularity, e-marketers should try to increase the online shopping frequency by
mitigating associated risks by having security verifications and privacy policy offered to
customers. This may increase their trust in online retailers as a way to keep their personal
information secured. Secondly, online sellers also should pay more attention to shipping
quality, both inner and outer city to ensure that customers can have satisfied experience when
shopping online, which can affect their reviews and comments about the shops and directly
influence ones’ fame and prestige. Thirdly, the focus should be on products characteristics,
including range, quality and price, as well as attracting customers by promoting sales and
other types like advertisements and publicity to capture the attention of university students
consequently. In addition, these promotions can be holiday-related or having celebrities or
well-known people to be their ambassadors as to captivate their targeted customers as
students.

6. Conclusion

In conclusion, we expect that the obtained results of our project can provide a deeper and
more thorough understanding of ITP students’ perspective and behaviors towards online
shopping in terms of popularity as well as decisive factors to purchase and repurchase. The
project, through the defined key elements influencing the behaviors of the subjects, will be
valuable to the online shopping industry in the sense of limiting weaknesses while promoting
strengths as compared to other type of commerce, especially those focusing on the youth or
students in Vietnam. This may serve as a foundation of a branch of online shopping websites
with particular targeted customers as university students. Furthermore, through our attempt to
differentiate local and boarding students in the above issue, there were several questions
posed from the project regarding the differences in genders, age groups and family
backgrounds that can have an impact on the variations in behaviors of students. Further
research, consequently, would be conducted to study this issue in a broader scope with more
diverse participant groups.
International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 13
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 14

References
Changchit, C. (2006). Consumer perceptions of online shopping. Issues in Information
systems, 7(2), pp.177-181.

Jiang, L., Yang, Z. and Jun, M. (2013). Measuring consumer perceptions of online shopping
convenience. Journal of Service Management, 24(2), pp.191-214.

Manzoor, A. (2010). E-commerce: an introduction. LAP Lambert Academic Publishing

GmbH & Co. KG, p.2.

Shanthi, R. and Kannaiah, D. (2015). Consumers’ Perception on Online Shopping. [online]

Iiste.org. Available at: http://iiste.org/Journals/index.php/JMCR/article/view/24487
[Accessed 7 Jun. 2018].

Shim, S., Eastlick, M., Lotz, S. and Warrington, P. (2001). An online prepurchase intentions
model. Journal of Retailing, 77(3), pp.397-416.

Stevens, L. (2016). Survey Shows Rapid Growth in Online Shopping. [online] WSJ. Available
at: https://www.wsj.com/articles/survey-shows-rapid-growth-in-online-shopping-
1465358582 [Accessed 7 Jun. 2018].
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 15

Appendices
QUESTIONNAIRE

I am Nguyen Khanh Vy, ITP Student, Banking Academy. I am doing a research project on
ITP students’ online shopping behaviors. This questionnaire is designed to help me acquire
information for my research project. I highly appreciate your opinions and responses which
are essential to the completion and the quality of my project. Please return the completed
questionnaire by May 31st, 2018. Thank you for your cooperation.

____________________________________________________________________________

1. Where are you from?

o Hanoi
o Other areas (Please specify)
________________________________________________________________
2. Have you ever make an online purchase?
o No ------ Go to Question 3
o Yes ------ Go to Question 4
3. Why don’t you want to go shopping online? (You can choose more than 1 answer)
o Delivery time
o Fraud and security fears
o Testing the goods
o Others (Please specify the reasons):
________________________________________________________________
Please go to Question 12 after having answered Question 3.
4. Why do you want to go shopping online? (You can choose more than 1 answer)
o It is cheap
o It is easy to search for products
o I can search and buy different products in at the same time
o I don’t have to bring items home on my own
o Others (Please specify):
________________________________________________________________
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 16

5. How often do you shop online?

o Hardly ever
o 1- 4 times a month
o 5 – 12 times a month
o More than 12 times a month
6. What are your most frequently purchased products?
o Clothes & Footwear products
o Books
o Cosmetic Products
o Food and Drinks
o Others (Please specify):
________________________________________________________________
7. How much do you usually spend on online products each month?
o Less than 500,000 VND
o From 500,000 VND to 2,000,000 VND
o From 2,000,000 VND to 5,000,000 VND
o More than 5,000,000 VND
8. What do you pay most attention to when choosing an online website? (You can
choose more than 1 answer)
o Products Range
o Fame and Prestige
o Web layout
o Recommendations
o Promotions and Sales
o Others (Please specify):
________________________________________________________________
9. Which of the following factors are the most important when deciding to make a
purchase? (Rank the top three factors by numbering them 1-3 where 1 is the most
important)
o Products Quality
o Products Price
o Customer Service
o Shipping Factors (Time and Fee)
o Reviews and Comments of previous users
o Member points for future purchases
10. How confident are you about the level of security of your payment information when
buying products online?

Confident Average Not confident

1 2 3 4 5

11. What can affect your decision of having repurchase intention the most? (Rank the top
three factors by numbering them 1-3 where 1 is the most important)
o System Availability
o Products Quality
 International Trading Program Students’ Online Shopping Behaviors 17

o Price
o Privacy
o Responsiveness
12. How would you evaluate the effectiveness of current popular shopping online
industry in Vietnam?

Excellent Average Terrible

1 2 3 4 5

THANK YOU

____________________________________________________________________________

(By Nguyen Khanh Vy, F11D, ITP of Banking Academy)