Empirical investigation on reputation and product information for trust formation in consumer to consumer market.

ABSTRACT

Online auctions have become one of the most interesting phenomena in electronic commerce. The online auction market is growing rapidly and providing auctioneers with many advantages. However, even though consumers can get the benefits of much more product diversity with potentially lower prices and sellers are able to meet many potential consumers, online auctions have their disadvantages such as fraud related to payment, delivery, and seller's anonymity. Accordingly, to be chosen by potential buyers, trust in the seller becomes one of the most important issues in an online consumer to consumer commerce (L e. online auctions market or C2C market).

The purpose of this research is to develop a research model of trust in seller, and to identify the antecedents and consequence of trust in the C2C e-commerce context. Trust in the seller was hypothesized to have direct, positive effects on the intention to bid for unfamiliar sellers. Moreover, two antecedents of trust in the seller were identified These were the perceived seller's reputation and the perceived quality of product information presented by the seller. These two factors were proposed to positively influence trust in the seller in the C2C e-commerce context. Data were collected from 120 college students in an experimental environment. Regression was employed to test three hypotheses, all of which were supported As hypothesized, trust in the seller had a significant positive effect on the intention to bid. Two proposed positive relationships between trust in the seller and its antecedents, such as the perceived seller's reputation and the perceived quality of product information given by the seller, were supported This study suggests that trust in the seller is one of the most important factors affecting buyers' auction behavior in even C2C e-commerce. Also, findings from this study suggest insights for online auction sellers, whether individual or small business e-tailers, in identifying important trust drivers, and in improving ability to impress potential consumers. Future research should further explore more antecedents related to trust in the seller in the C2C e-commerce context.

1. INTRODUCTION

The Internet has tremendously changed the way people exchange their goods or services. In recent years, various kinds of e-commerce have proliferated. One of the most interesting developments in electronic commerce can be said to be online auctions, customer-to customer (C2C) e-commerce. Consumers and sellers from all over the world may participate in trading relationships without constraints. One of the successful and popular online auction markets offers over 3 million items for sale at any time for anyone, from anywhere (Trager, 2000). This site has grown very rapidly at a rate of approximately 12 % per month in 1998-99(Lucking-Reiley, Bryan, Prasad, and Reeves, 2000). Many e-retailers, such as Amazon.com and traditional retailers such as Sharper Image have opened online auction sites (Ottaway, Bruneau, and Evans, 2003). Further, researchers at IBM anticipate that auctions of various kinds will replace the common "fixed pricing" model in much of the web within the next 20 years (Chui and Zwick, 1999). It is estimated that value of goods and services sold over the Internet using auction technology will be $15 billion in the year 2004 (Trager, 2000). Although many studies have researched the importance of trust, as well as the antecedents and consequences of trust in business-to-customer (B2C) e-commerce context, little theoretical and empirical research has examined how trust is initiated and how it influences buyers' behavior in customer-to customer (C2C) e-commerce contexts. In view of the increasing market size of C2C e-commerce investigating the antecedents and effects of trust in C2C e-commerce context is important, not only for individual and business sellers but also for online auction sites (Strader and Ramaswami, 2002). Research has not identified how the seller's reputation affects bidding numbers or price premium based on a theoretical background. Accordingly, this present study will identify trust as an important component of buyers' bidding behavior and suggest how trust is developed in the C2C ecommerce context, providing an exploratory model to describe the relationship between trust and other factors. Findings from this study will benefit online auctioneers, such as sellers and intermediary websites, because the direct trust drivers that will be identified will help individual/business sellers and intermediary online auction website managers better understand buyers' needs and expectations.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

Previous research in traditional marketing and in B2C e-commerce has shown that trust has a critical effect on perceived risk, positive attitude toward the e-retailer, intention to buy from the e-retailer, and the long term relationship between buyer and seller (Doney and Cannon, 1997; McKnight, Choundhury, and Kacmar, 2002). Moreover, several studies in B2C e-commerce have identified many antecedents of trust, such as the perceived e-retailer's reputation and size (Doney and Cannon, 1997; Jarvenpaa et al., 2000), web site quality including information quality (Yoon, 2002; McKnight et al., 2002), consumer's disposition to trust (Gefen, 2000), and institutional features (McKnight et al., 2002). From among the above findings, some results in the B2C e-commerce context may apply to in the C2C e-commerce context. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to identify the factors affecting trust in the seller in the C2C e-commerce context, and to examine the impact of trust on potential consumers' auction behavior. The present research will first focus on trust formation theory in traditional marketing and B2C e-commerce and suggest the exploratory research model of trust building in C2C e-commerce, and second, on the effect of selected online auction environment factors on trust in the seller.

The concept of trust is in central to this relationship. Next, the definition of C2C e-commerce will be discussed, and an exploratory research model and the relevant literature regarding trust in off- and online will be suggested. Then, two antecedents, namely the seller's reputation and the quality of product information, will be presented as determinants affecting trust in the sellers in C2C e-commerce.

2.1 C2C E-Commerce

Before discussing trust in the seller in C2C e-commerce, it is necessary to provide a clear definition of the central construct of this study. In this study, C2C e-commerce is conceptualized as an Internet transaction at an intermediary site that engages in the direct sales of product from consumer to consumer. Generally, the interactive online auction has been defined as an environment in which bids are submitted online and immediately posted so that all bidders can monitor the most updated bidding status (Chuiand Zwick, 1999). Further, there are three basic kinds of interactive online auctions: business-to-business, business-to-customer, and customer-to-customer (Bauerly, 1998; Bapna, Goes, and Gupta, 2001). C2C online auction is also known as person-to-person or listing agent auction. Anyone, not only individual sellers but also business sellers, can list items for auction, and anyone can bid. The auction site acts just as an intermediary. In this case, there is no fraud-preventing guarantee nor assurance of product quality for participants in C2C auctions, so the difficulty of security and the possibility of fraud are higher than any other kinds of auctions or any other net shopping (Chong, Yang, and Wong, 2003).However, some small merchants or business sellers use these auction as one of their sales channels and place products on these web sites for auctioning. There are sites that play two roles, both offering products to consumers and acting as intermediary between merchant and consumer. This kind of online auction is called business-to customer online auction (Banpa et al., 2001). In this case, products come from dealers, wholesalers, manufacturers, distributors, discount vendors, or surplus companies. Lastly, there are auction sites similar to the B2C model, except that they target business consumers instead of individual consumers.

2.2 Importance of Trust in C2C E-commerce

Even though buyers can get the benefits of much more product diversity with potentially lower prices and sellers are able to meet lots of potential consumers, online auctions also have their disadvantages. First, it is very difficult to bind one identity to one trader (Kauffman and Wood, 2003). In other words, the sellers in online auctions can remain anonymous or change their identities easily (Ba and Pavlou, 2002). Thus, these online auction environments make opportunistic behavior more attractive to sellers. Despite some norms and regulations, there are few well-established institutional rules and contracts to control online auction transactions, which also gives rise to opportunism under the environment of anonymity. The most common fraud occurs in online auction where a seller collects payment without intending to send the goods to a buyer. Therefore, the separation of payment and delivery, especially in online auctions, can raise more perceived risk for buyers than in any other online e-commerce context (Kollock, 1999). Another problem with online auctions is that it is impossible to inspect the goods that consumers want before bidding as in B2C e-commerce, so consumers in online auctions have to rely on electronic information without having the ability to physically inspect the product. Hence, they are vulnerable to additional risks because of potentially incomplete or distorted information provided by sellers (Lee, 1998). Accordingly, earning and building potential buyers' trust in online auctions becomes one of the major issues (Strader and Ramaswami, 2002), as in B2C e-commerce. In order for sellers to successfully conduct transactions with potential consumers, the above two disadvantages of online auctions must be overcome.

Generally, trust is an important factor in many interactions under the headings of uncertainty and dependency concerns. So, in the context of online auctions, buyers can not be sure of bidding on goods and receiving the items safely, and they must depend on the seller. Also, sellers should help consumers develop trust in the seller, because trust becomes one of the most important factors influencing whether the seller is chosen by potential buyers in a C2C e-commerce context (Strader and Ramaswami, 2002). Thus, it is important to understand online the auction consumer's behavior related to trust. For this reason, many researchers are turning their attentions to various features of C2C e-commerce.

2.3 Characteristics of Online C2C Consumers

Little research has identified characteristics of online auctioneers. However, Kelley, Delhagen and Chaskey (2002) analyzed the shoppers of online stores and online auction sites, and compared between two shoppers. Based on their study, the characteristics of online auction customers in C2C e-commerce can be identified. According to this analysis three demographic and attitudinal features can be explained. First, online auctioneers are younger and less affluent. Online auctioneers are an average of four years younger and their average household income is $ 60,900 less than online store shoppers. Also, they are less likely to have a college degree than online shoppers. Second, online auctioneers spend more than online shoppers on consumer electronics, home products and toys, which is consistent with previous research regarding products purchased in online auctions (Lucking-Reiley, 1999). On the other hand, online store shoppers spend more on media products, including books, music, DVDs and videos. Lastly, online auctioneers are more likely to report that price is more important than brand names. Also, they're more likely to buy most things on sale and to look for promotions (Kelley et al., 2002).

3. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ON TRUST AND REPUTATION

Trust has been reviewed widely in many research areas such as social exchange literature, marketing literature, and economic literature. Nevertheless, there is no generally accepted definition of trust. Within the context of social exchange theory, Blau (1964) refer to trust as "the belief that a party's word or promise is reliable and a party will fulfill his/her obligations in an exchange relationship". On the other hand, in the marketing literature, Moorman, Deshpande, and Zaltman (1993) conceptualize trust as a willingness to rely on an exchange partner in whom one has confidence. Morgan and Hunt (1994) define trust as existing when one party has confidence in an exchange partner's reliability and integrity, which excludes the behavioral intention of "willingness" in contrast to the definition of Moorman et al (1993). They view "willingness to rely" as an outcome (or, alternatively, a potential indicator) of trust, not as a part of how one defines it (Morgan and Hunt, 1994). Accordingly, Moorman et al's(1993) and Morgan and Hunt's(1994) definitions emphasize the importance of confidence in the trusting party, which usually come from the belief that the party is reliable and has high integrity, related to the party's qualities of being consistent, competence, honest, fair, responsible, helpful, and benevolent (Dwyer and LaGace, 1986; Rotter, 1967)

3.1 Definition of Trust in C2C e-commerce

According to Resnick and Zeckhuser (2000), during their five-month eBay data collection period, 89.0% of all seller-buyer pairs conducted just one transaction, and 98.9% conducted no more than four. So, the online auction market can be characterized by one-time transactions, which is different from the environment of traditional marketing. In the traditional marketing literature, trust has been focused on repeated buyer-seller relationships. However, in the C2C e-commerce context, trust should be emphasized based just on the belief that the seller will be honest and reliable, not benevolent. That is, trust in online auction transactions may be developed based on one-time transaction not considering long term relationships. Also, online auctions can be characterized more by uncertainty than any other context (Chong et al, 2003), so potential buyers should rely on sellers and their information with confident expectation regarding beneficial outcome. In order to examine the buyer's trust in the seller in C2C e-commerce contexts, trust in the seller is defined as buyers' willingness to rely on sellers and to take action in circumstances where such action makes the buyers vulnerable to the seller based on positive expectation of the sellers' future behavior, a definition that builds on the definition provided in Mayer et al. (1995) and McKnight et al. (1998).

4. RESEARCH MODEL

The exploratory research model that serves as the foundation for this study is presented in Figure 1. The left side of the model describes two proposed antecedents to trust in C2C e-commerce: perceived sellers' reputation and perceived quality of information given by the seller. The right side of the model expresses the relationship between the buyer's trust in the seller and the intention to bid.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

5. HYPOTHESES

In this study, intention to bid is defined as buyer's willingness to bid for the seller in C2C e-commerce contexts. If potential buyers decide to bid and buy items from unfamiliar sellers, purchasing may be at risk of not receiving the products bought and then having to resolve seller's opportunistic behaviors. Thus, this intention to bid can be an important outcome of trust. If carried out, this intention would become trust-related behavior. On the other hand, Ba and Pavlou (2002) identified that trust in the seller in online auctions generated the willingness to pay more. Accordingly, it is proposed in this study that if buyers have more trust in the seller, they will be more likely to bid for the trustworthy seller in C2C e-commerce. Thus, the following hypothesis, H1, is proposed.

H1: The buyer's trust in the seller will have a positive effect on the intentions to bid for the seller in C2C e-commerce.

As antecedents of trust, many factors have been reported in relationship marketing, even in the business-to-customer e-commerce context. However, based on previous research regarding trust in traditional marketing and Internet marketing, this study will suggest the perceived seller's reputation and perceived quality of product information are key factors influencing trust in the sellers in C2C e-commerce context.

H2: Perceived seller's reputation will have a positive effect on the buyer's trust in the seller in C2C e-commerce context.

Since information presented by the seller provides the first experiential taste and initial impression of the seller in a C2C e-commerce context, perceived quality of product information might be related positively to trusting intention. For example, well-designed information could make potential buyers give a second look and the sellers' computer skill or marketable skills in the product description may attract the interests of potential buyers (Parker, 1998). According to Lohse and Spiller (1998), a well-formatted description with a picture of the offering item may help buyers' understanding and reduce the buyer's uncertainty about the quality of the product. Therefore, a good image from the product information with some visual cues will be useful in earning trust in the seller. However, inaccuracy of information may lead to buyer's concerns about the believability or reliability of the information source (Wand and Wang, 1996). If buyers perceive that the product information is understandable, reliable and of high quality, they will assume that the seller has positive attributes and will form trusting intentions. This leads to the third hypothesis.

H3: Perceived quality of product information given by the seller will have a positive effect on the buyer's trust in the seller in C2C e-commerce context.

6. METHODOLOGY

6.1 Sample and Data Collection

The sample consisted primarily of students from a Midwestern university. The students participated in the study voluntarily. Students were selected as sample respondents because they tend to have more access to the Internet than other consumers (Lake, 2001). They were randomly assigned to one of two conditions of online auction websites, each consisting of 60 subjects. After participants' browsing, they were asked about their perceptions of seller's reputations, of quality of product information presented by the seller, trust in the seller, and intention to bid for this seller.

6.2 Websites

The seller's purpose in the online auction in the experiment was to sell laptops. This study used a laptop to measure the antecedents of trust in the seller, because electronics and computers are one of the largest categories of goods sold in online auction market (Luckin-Reiley et al., 2000; Chui and Zwick, 1998) and university students are familiar with this item.

The two identical online auction websites (See Appendix C) for the experiments were composed of several pages in each website: [] Main Page containing lists of bidding items, [] Feedback Forum(Reputation Rating), a page regarding the seller's reputation and product information presented by the seller including images of items,[] Feedback Summary presenting a summary of buyer's recent comments about the seller over the past 6 months.

6.3 Seller's Reputation Rating and Feedback

Generally, in online auction sites, feedback is classified as negative, neutral, or positive with positive feedback receiving +1 point, neutral feedback 0 point, and negative feedback -1 point. Therefore, the sum score is reported as the "seller's reputation rating" on an auction listings. According to this rule, the websites in this study were manipulated by the two different reputation ratings (= summary feedback score) and feedback summary (=comments): one website for "positive reputation" had a 100% positive (+) / 0% neutral (0) and 0% negative (-) seller's reputation rating and comments written by other buyers, which means this seller had received positive ratings without no neutral and negative feedback score. The second had a 0% for all three seller's reputation rating criteria and no comments, as would be typical of a new seller (see Appendix C). So, when a participant searched for items, he/she could see a summary listing of item with item title and the current price. After clicking through to the item's full description page, the summary feedback scores (=reputation ratings) were displayed. If the buyer chose to click on the summary feedback score, he/she saw details of the seller's feedback file (=comments), which included individual comments about the seller in one of the two websites conditions. The other condition called "no reputation" did not have any comments (= seller's feedback file) and had a summary feedback score with 0% rating for all positive/neutral/ negative categories. Also, the individual positive comments about the seller in the seller's feedback file were classified based on Resnick and Zeckhuser (2000).

6.4 Product Information Presented by the Seller

Except for the seller's reputation rating and comments, all production information in the descriptive section contained identical information, because product information quality can be perceived differently according to subjects without special manipulation. On both websites, product information included condition of product, 27 product features (specification), 3 photographs including front view, back view, and bottom view of computers, posted fixed ending dates, information on payment methods, and shipping and handling change. The product information descriptions were taken from real eBay auctions. Participants spent 10 minutes engaged in bidding activities with websites created for this experiment.

7. MEASURES AND PROCEDURES

Scales from previous research were adapted to measure the constructs proposed in the model. Meanwhile, some items were modified to apply the C2C e-commerce context. Perceived quality of product information was measured in terms of understandability, usefulness, and reliability.

The preliminary questionnaire and the websites conducted for this study were pre-tested and reviewed by graduate students for clarity and completeness. For this experiment, the two websites were intended to manipulate two different seller's reputation ratings. Before implementing the experiment, both websites were pre-tested with graduate students to determine whether the websites were effective and to refine them if necessary. For the main study, participants were randomly assigned to two different online auction websites conducted for this study, positive reputation website and no reputation website, in order to create variances among the perceived seller's reputation. Participants in the one group were presented with the websites containing positive seller's reputation ratings and comments. The other group participants were assigned to the websites with no seller's reputation information as with a new seller. Each group contained 60 participants. Participants were asked to pretend that they were buying laptop from an unfamiliar seller on an online auction context before browsing the websites. Then, participants received questionnaires consisting not only of instructions that showed the website's address and a scenario, but also of main questions about perceptions of the seller's reputation and of quality of product information given by the seller, trust in the seller, behaviors, and demography. After asking participants to read the instructions and to browse the websites, the author asked them to fill out the questionnaire.

8. RESULTS

First, the demographics of the sample and their online auction behaviors in the C2C e-commerce context will be reported. Second, preliminary analysis is conducted to check reliability of the four constructs used in this study. Third, effects of the antecedents suggested in this study on trust and the effect of trust in the seller on intention to bid, and a summary of the hypotheses test will be presented.

8.1 Trust and Intention to Bid

To test the impact of trust on online C2C (auction) behavior, a regression analysis was conducted. According to this analysis, trust was the major predictor of intention to bid in the C2C e-commerce context (beta=.694, p<.01), which was consistent with previous research (Ba and Pavlou, 2002). Ba and Pavlou suggested the positive relationship between trust in the seller and the willingness to submit more payment in online auctions. Around forty-eight percent of the variance in intention to bid can be explained by this model. This result supports H1, which hypothesized that the buyer's trust would have a positive effect on intentions to bid for the seller in C2C e-commerce.

8.2 Effects on Trust

For the purpose of testing the effects of antecedent variables on trust among sellers in C2C e-commerce contexts, regression analyses were performed. Based on previous studies, two antecedents, the perceived seller's reputation and the perceived quality of product information presented by the seller, were tested in this study. Both the seller's reputation and the quality of product information presented by sellers were found to significantly affect trust in the sellers in C2C e-commerce context. Therefore, H2, which hypothesized that the perceived seller's reputation would have a positive effect on the buyer's trust in the seller in C2C e-commerce, was supported (beta=.488, p<.01); this finding is consistent with earlier studies (Ba and Pavlou, 2002, Strader and Ramaswami, 2002; Jarvenpaar et al., 2000). H3, which hypothesized that the perceived quality of product information given by the seller would have a positive effect on the buyer's trust in C2C e-commerce, was supported (beta=.266, p<.01).

9. DISCUSSION, IMPLICATION AND CONCLUSION

The purpose of this study was to identify the factors affecting trust in the seller in C2C e-commerce context and to examine the impact of trust on a buyer's intention to bid for an unfamiliar seller. Based on the review of literature and findings from previous studies, two factors influencing trust in the seller in C2C context were identified. The research model regarding trust building in the C2C e-commerce context was constructed to describe the factors affecting trust in the seller, and examine the relationship between trust in the seller and intention to bid. Regression analysis supported all of the hypothesized relationships. Although trust in e-commerce is traditionally defined in various ways, in this study, trust was operationalized as the buyer's willingness to rely on the seller and to take action in circumstances where such action makes the buyer vulnerable to the seller with an expectation for the seller's future behaviors in C2C e-commerce context. Also, based on evidence from previous research, this study identified two factors influencing trust in the seller in C2C e-commerce. These factors were the perceived seller's reputation and the perceived quality of the product information presented by the seller. Further, this study suggested the positive relationship between trust and intention to bid for the seller in anticipating real auction behaviors according to previous studies. Overall, this study suggests that trust in the seller is an important factor to anticipate potential buyers' bidding behavior in C2C e-commerce contexts, as does in B2C e-commerce settings. Further, this study shows that the seller's reputation is a critical factor affecting trust building in C2C e-commerce contexts, which online auction sellers should consider. Different from previous Information Technology research (McDonald and Slawson, 2000; Ottaway et al., 2003), which showed the effect of reputation on bidding number or price premium, this study identified the effect of seller's reputation on trust in the seller and theoretical background about the buyer's online auction behavior. Also, the quality of product information given by the seller can be one of the most important factors in online auctions according to the results of this study.

Even though this study has some limitations, the results of the present study give some managerial implications for marketers and researchers. This study confirms that trust in the seller in a C2C e-commerce context can affect intention to bid. Potential buyers may be willing to bid if the risk can be minimized by the reliable and reputable previous actions of the seller. Further, as buyers' bidding becomes more competitive, sellers can more easily enhance their reputation and sell their items at a higher price. Accordingly, trust in the seller plays an important role in terms of trust premium (the extra amount a buyer is willing to pay) as suggested by previous studies (Strader and Ramanswami, 2002). Therefore, sellers in C2C e-commerce contexts should build potential buyers' trust to receive higher profit margins in online auction markets. This study showed two antecedents of trust in the seller, seller's reputation and quality of product information in C2C e-commerce contexts. The seller's reputation can build trust in the seller, because a new user who has no experience with this seller may rely on the experience of others as reflected in reputation ratings and comments that other buyers leave online auction markets.

Perceived quality of product information was shown to build buyers' trust in the seller, because buyers tend to decide the attributes of the seller based on how good the information is that is suggested to them, as noted earlier. Also, good product information might reduce information asymmetry between buyers and sellers in the C2C e-commerce context and relieve the buyer's concerns and anxiety. This implies that sellers should concentrate on providing reliable, accurate, useful, and understandable product information and ways to suggest product information so as to impress buyers.

Definitions on variables are as follow(table1):

Model Constructs        Definitions

Perceived seller's      Reputation is defined as the extent to which
reputation              buyers assign attribute to the seller based on
                        second-hand information about them
Perceived quality on    Information quality refers to the
product information     understandability, reliability, and usefulness
                        of the products information presented by the
                        seller
Trust                   Buyers' willingness to rely on the seller and
                        to take action in circumstances where such
                        action makes the buyer vulnerable to seller
                        based on positive expecting the seller's
                        future behaviors
Intention to Bid        Buyer's willingness to bid for the seller

Table 2. Measurement of Variables

Variables              Indicator   Scale of Items

Perceived Seller's     Rep 1       This seller is well known.
Reputation             Rep 2 *     This seller has a bad reputation in
                                   the market of this online auction. *
                       Rep 3       This seller has a good reputation in
                                   the market of this online auction.
Perceived Quality of   Info 1      Product information presented by
Product Information                this seller appears to be believable
                                   to me.
                       Info 2      I understand the purpose of this
                                   seller.
                       Info 3      I clearly understand the services
                                   and products presented by this
                                   seller by looking this product
                                   information.
                       Info 4      Viewing this product information
                                   gives me a good image of this
                                   seller.
                       Info 5      Product information presented by
                                   this seller is useful to me.
Trust                  Trust1      The seller is trustworthy.
                       Trust2      The seller wants to be known as one
                                   who keeps promises and commitments.
                       Trust3      I trust this seller keeps my best
                                   interest in mind.
                       Trust4 *    I find it necessary to be cautious
                                   with this seller. *
                       Trust5      This seller has more to lose than to
                                   gain by not delivering on their
                                   promises.
                       Trust6      This seller's behavior will meet my
                                   expectations.
Intention to Bid       Bid1        If I had a need to buy, I would want
                                   to bid for this seller.
                       Bid2        How likely is it that you would use
                                   this seller again?
                       Bid3        For this purchase, how likely is it
                                   that you would buy from this seller?

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