Factors Influencing Online Purchasing Intention among College Students in Nairobi City

Abstract

Technology evolves at a very fast pace, sometimes faster than the users can accept and adopt it. With the rapid evolution of technology, online shopping has also evolved. This platform poses as a viable substitute for the traditional brick and mortar set up. But as mentioned above the uptake of online shopping has not been as fast as the evolution of the platform. The purpose of this study was to determine the factors that influence online purchase intention among college students in Nairobi. The study sought to answer the following questions: how does Perceived Usefulness (PU) influence the intention to purchase online among college students in Nairobi; how does Perceived Ease of Use (PEoU) influence the intention to purchase online among college students in Nairobi; how does Transactional (TS) Security influence the intention to purchase online among college students in Nairobi. A quantitative study was carried out with 120 respondents that included students from the University of Nairobi. A model based on the Technology Acceptance Model was used and the findings assessed by descriptive statistics and regression analysis. The findings reveal that Perceived Ease of Use (PEoU), Perceived Usefulness (PU) and Transactional Security (TS) are determinants of online purchase intention among college students in Nairobi. The model analysis of regression showed that there is a strong positive relationship between intention to purchase online and Transactional Security, Perceived Usefulness and Perceived Ease of Use. The factors shared a 68% variation of intention to shop online. Perceived Usefulness was the most important variable followed by Perceived Ease of Use and lastly by Transactional Security. Based on the findings of the study the following recommendations were made: more online shops should be set up to increase competition, this in turn will increase Perceived Ease of Use. Those online shopping platforms already in the Kenyan market should always be on the creative edge to continue being useful to the consumer; online shops should be user friendly and very easy to use; shopping sites should not ask for excessive information from the customers, this creates a sense of insecurity in the consumer and hardens the shopping process; the government should formulate and enact policies that look into protecting end users as they use online shopping platforms. Further research should be done to establish why most of the students did not find Transactional Security to be more important than perceived Ease of Use (PEoU) and Perceived Usefulness (PU).