Behavioral changes of multichannel customers: Their persistence and influencing factors

This study addresses how behavioral changes following a new channel's adoption persist over time, and how their patterns vary among customers. We verify the roles of individual behavioral traits reflecting self-selection, marketing exposure, and loyalty in explaining these differences. Based on the elaboration likelihood model and attitude commitment theory, we develop hypotheses to predict these traits' effects on customers' membership in a particular segment with a unique post-adoption behavioral pattern. A latent class model is developed to empirically identify various customer segments and connect behavioral traits to the probability of segment membership. The results reveal that only 25% of the sample exhibits permanent behavioral changes, and most of these tend to buy from numerous stores with intense cross-buying. Approximately 43% of customers who temporarily changed their behaviors were strongly inclined to use multiple shopping channels and spend substantial amounts on hedonic products. The remaining 32% who did not change their purchases appear to be frequent buyers. We also discuss the work's implications for managing multichannel customers.