Evaluating the Susceptibility of E-commerce Shoppers to Persuasive Strategies. A Game-Based Approach

Abstract

Research suggests that persuasive strategies are more effective when tailored to individuals or groups of similar individuals. Demographic data such as gender, age, culture, and personality are being used in domains such as health to tailor persuasive strategies. However, in e-commerce, these factors are unknown to e-commerce companies making it impossible to use them to tailor persuasive strategies. Other factors such as shoppers’ online motivation have been proposed as suitable factors to use in tailoring persuasive strategies in e-commerce. To contribute to research in this area, we investigated the susceptibility of e-commerce shoppers to persuasive strategies based on their online shopping motivation. To achieve this, we developed and evaluated a shopping game, ShopRight that simulates a retail store where players can shop for groceries. The healthiest product on each aisle is presented to the player along with a persuasive message. We recruited 187 participants to play ShopRight for at least three rounds. Players were classified into groups based on their online shopping motivation and their responses to the persuasive messages were recorded. Using pre- and post-game surveys, we also identified changes in attitude, intention, self-efficacy and perceived price of products.