Empirical taxonomy of services and service products in electronic commerce

In this study, we newly classify services and service products in EC into four categories: Mass Services, Interactive Services, Supporting Services, and Professional Services. Five selected variables reflecting the characteristics of the services, and two factorized dimensions, (1) proportion of on-line services, and (2) need of on-line interaction, are utilized for the classification. In addition, the relationships with customer purchase intentions in EC are investigated as a result of the classification. For this purpose, a customer survey was conducted on respondent groups who frequently purchase goods or services by EC and who also had advanced knowledge of the services and EC. Statistical methods of factor analysis, cluster analysis, and analysis of variance were utilized for analysis of the data.  2002 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.