Title: Examining the presence of customer service-based strategic clusters in online retailing and the impact of service features on conversion rates

Authors: Ravi Narayanaswamy; Richard A. Heiens

Addresses: School of Business Administration, University of South Carolina Aiken, 471 University Parkway, Aiken, SC 29801, USA ' Department of Business Administration, University of South Carolina Beaufort, One University Boulevard, Bluffton, SC 29909, USA

Abstract: This study represents the first effort to examine, profile, and evaluate the customer-service strategies of the largest e-commerce retailers. The study employed a syndicated database of the largest online retailers in the US market for 2019. The two-step cluster analysis algorithm available in SPSS was used to help identify the presence of customer-oriented strategic clusters among the 172 web-only retailers contained in the database. The findings clearly demonstrate the presence of four distinct strategic clusters that display characteristics consistent with the Miles and Snow strategic typology. In addition, firms that operate with a strategic posture emphasising relatively more customer services are rewarded for doing so with a correspondingly high number of monthly visitors, high conversion rates, and high average ticket values.

Keywords: Miles and Snow; strategic typology; online retailing; customer service; conversion rates; cluster analysis.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEMR.2025.144748

International Journal of Electronic Marketing and Retailing, 2025 Vol.16 No.2, pp.159 - 174

Received: 28 Aug 2022
Accepted: 27 Dec 2022
Published online: 03 Mar 2025 *

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