Understanding Adoption and Continuance of Online Direct Sales Channel

ABSTRACT

Many small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have built web presence, but few have advanced further to embrace the Internet as an online direct sales channel (ODSC). This study proposes and empirically tests a research model on the role of two risk constructs––perceived risk and risk propensity—in the adoption and continued use of ODSC among SMEs. The results show that the roles of the two risk constructs differ substantially: risk propensity has a direct and an indirect effect, but perceived risk only has an indirect effect, on SMEs’ intention to use ODSC. Furthermore, the impacts of the two risk constructs differ in the two temporal stages––the adoption and continued use––of ODSC. The findings of the study validate behavioral decision theories from a risk perspective that non-rational (i.e., risk propensity) as well as rational factors (i.e., perceived risk and perceived business value) shapes organizational decision-making.

KEYWORDS:

• Perceived risk
• risk propensity
• innovation diffusion
• post-adoption continuance
• SMEs

Additional information

Funding

We acknowledge the financial support from National Natural Science Foundation of China [#71471125, #71662001 and #71771127].