Nurturing sales entrepreneurship in consumer-to-consumer marketplaces

Carol X. J. Ou, Wing Sze Poon, Paul A. Pavlou, Robert M. Davison

Research output: Chapters, Conference Papers, Creative and Literary WorksRGC 32 - Refereed conference paper (with host publication)peer-review

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Abstract

Buyers and sellers jointly determine a market's development and equilibrium. While the literature has focused on enhancing online marketplaces from the buyer's perspective, designing marketplaces from the seller's perspective has received much less attention. Practically, online consumer-to-consumer (C2C) marketplaces have nurtured business and created many job opportunities, evidenced by TaoBao, China's leading marketplace. This study explores how online marketplaces nurture entrepreneurship from the seller's perspective. Extending the task-technology fit model, we propose that the entrepreneurial sellers' motivations to use online C2C marketplaces are to achieve financial security, independence, innovation, recognition, roles and self-realization. C2C marketplaces can be designed accordingly to facilitate information exchange, transactions, customization and back-end integration. We argue that a fit between the seller's entrepreneurial tasks and technological characteristics determines the seller's satisfaction, marketplace utilization, and sales performance. The proposed model is verified by 128 TaoBao sellers. We discuss the implications and next steps of this research. © (2011) by the AIS/ICIS Administrative Office All rights reserved.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationInternational Conference on Information Systems 2011, ICIS 2011
Pages3685-3694
Volume5
Publication statusPublished - 2011
Event32nd International Conference on Information System (ICIS 2011) - Shanghai, China
Duration: 4 Dec 20117 Dec 2011

Publication series

Name
Volume5

Conference

Conference32nd International Conference on Information System (ICIS 2011)
PlaceChina
CityShanghai
Period4/12/117/12/11

Research Keywords

  • Entrepreneurial seller
  • Online consumer-to-consumer (C2C) marketplace
  • Sales performance
  • Task-technology fit
  • Utilization

Publisher's Copyright Statement

  • COPYRIGHT TERMS OF DEPOSITED POSTPRINT FILE: © The Author(s).

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