ZAPPOS the largest online shoe retailer Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

ZAPPOS the largest online shoe retailer - Essay Example It achieves a competitive advantage over its rivals through the loyalty business strategy and the liaison marketing that is embraces. The key source that contributes to the growth and development of Zappos.com is the recurring customers and the oral recommendations from consumers that receive quality services. Over its course of operation, this company has over 75% of recurring consumers. The customer service has a better reputation that is augmented by the online trust drivers that the company utilizes in increasing its loyalty, credibility, and trust among others towards the buyers. Internet marketing has tremendous influenced the welfare of this organization. I used to navigate through the website aimlessly and after I was assigned the task of searching its validity, I had to evaluate its website in order to ensure that, it is a reliable website and one could place an order with ease. In my evaluation, I consulted various scholars, researchers, peer-reviewed sources, and so forth in order to determine the forces behind Zappos.com being the largest online shoe retailer. Online trust was the key aspect that enhanced the wellbeing of Zappos.com (Cheskin/Sapient Report, 1999). It is essential to adopt an acceptable definition of trust before commencing on this topic. According to† (Rousseau, Sitkin, Burt and Camerer, 1998, p. 395), â€Å"Trust is an emotional state that comprises the aim to accept the liability established on the positive anticipations of behaviors of another†. Trust entails the enthusiasm to agree to the susceptibility, but with hope that a person can depend on the other party (Lewicki et. al. 1998; Moorman, Zaltman & Deshpande, 1992; Morgan and Hunt, 1994). In internet marketing, trust is perceived in lieu of relationship marketing (Doney and Cannon 1997; Dwyer, Schurr and Oh 1987; Ganesan 1994; Ganesan and Hess 1997; Morgan and Hunt 1994). In addition, in studying the Buyer –seller interactions, trust between the two perso ns takes time and depends on the observations that the buyer makes on the seller’s, consistency, constancy and credibility (Anderson and Narus, 1990; Doney and Cannon, 1997; Gane san, 1994). This view is unswerving with the behavioral reliance proposed by Schlosser, White, and Lloyd, 2003). Online trust, or rather the trust on the internet, greatly differs from offline trust in significant ways. As opposed to the offline trust, the key thing in online trust in the website, application of internet in transactions and the technology used. The website used by a firm can make a good foundation in building the customers trust, and thus enhancing the reputation of the seller (Jarvenpaa et al. 2000). The manner in which a customer would relate to an offline seller is similar to his/her dealing with a website and customers develop views of trust in a website depending on their relationship with the website. To the degree that a customer develops some positive impact about a website a nd accept liability, he/she must develop some trust with the website. The customers view pertaining to the competence of a website to carry out its purpose, and its perception in offering quality services behind the online business is contributive to his/her insight of trust in the website. In this context, online trust comprises customer perceptions of the way the site would deliver based on the expectations of the customer, and the authenticity of the information and self-assurance of the site. There are various perceptions driven by numerous precursors. Effects of Drivers of Online Trust Even though, online trusts have numerous potential antecedents and impacts, as detailed by Shankar et al. (2002), based on