멀티채널 환경에서 소비자는 어떻게 정보를 탐색하는가?: 선호하는 정보원천에 따른 소비자 유형화와 관련 요인 = How Do Consumers Search for Information in Multi-channel Environment?: Consumer Typology Based on Their Choice of Information Channel

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Recently, businesses face new challenges of internet which has been discussed to have potential as a medium for extending the range of consumers` information sources. Via the newly introduced media such as blogs, SNS businesses are trying to interact market and its consumer. For example food company ``Pulmuone`` runs a blog. It is not only for a publicizing and promoting its brand or for e-commerce, but also for interact with consumers. Specifically it focuses consumergenerated information, how its products are used in the context of consumption. Official company blogs when first introduced, were only used as a marketer-driven consumer information source, but now we can easily find consumer-generated information. Moreover even individual consumer blogs posted recommendations and product reviews in a form ``a consumer`s view`` sometimes that are the result of featured or sponsored. For instance, one of ``power bloggers`` imposed a fine for not clarifying corporate sponsorship in 2011. As such the distinctive line that separated marketer-driven information source from consumer- generated information source is now blurred. These kind of mixed status makes consumer confused. Even though the typology of information sources are becoming more complex, most of the studies did not consider consumers` information search behavior in various information channel environment. Moreover previous studies applied the outdated framework for categorizing information sources: market-driven information sources, neutral information sources, consumer generated information sources. In early 2000`s, there was a discussion about the classification of consumer information source within internet era, but the discussion was limited to the internet as a platform, and thus focus was placed on offline or online. The framework for analyzing consumer information sources currently used does not guarantee adequacy in the present market environment, since it lacks considerations for unique traits and benefits of various information channels. Thus, it is necessary to explore consumers` information search behavior with an advanced approach. It is important to understand how individuals perceive the range of information channels available to them and how those perceptions affect their use of different types of sources. These attempts enable us to draw the new standards for consumers` information sources. This study investigates consumers` use of new and traditional information sources, and identify new typology of consumers based on their choice of information channels. The major findings of this study are as follows. First, our results show that the distinction of online consumers and offline consumers may no longer be useful, since most consumers were found to use both channels. Respondents tended to use online information sources more than offline sources, and online shoppingmall was found to be the most preferred information channel. Second, consumers were a classified into 5 clusters; ``heavy searchers``, ``objective information searchers``, ``interpersonal information searchers``, ``infomediary searchers``, ``offline information searchers``. Each consumer segments were significantly different from the amount of information search and sources or patterns of information search. ``Heavy searchers`` are trying to find extensive information over diverse information sources except for offline channel based information. ``Objective information searchers`` are also heavy information users like ``heavy searchers``, but they favor price comparison site and articles. ``Interpersonal information searchers`` highly rely on interpersonal sources such as online communities, families and friends. ``infomediary searchers`` contain the largest number of individuals who do not utilize information except for detailed information that are posted by online shopping mall. ``Offline information searchers`` are consisted with whom trust offline channel so that they can confirm the products. Third, multinomial-logit analysis was conducted to explore the impact of the consumers` demographic variables, purchased goods, and consumers` shopping propensity, on consumers use of information channels. Total amount of information search was impacted by consumers` information seeking propensity, shopping indifference, and their hedonic value. Which information source were selected and used for the consumers` decision making, were largely depended on consumers` gender, age and the purchased goods. The results of this study will provide significant insights for the effective communication strategies for the consumer information providers such as marketers and the governors.

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