THE ELEMENTS THAT DOMINANT SUSTAINABLE E-COMMERCE PURCHASING: MALAYSIAN FASHION INDUSTRY

 ABOUT THE RESEARCH 

Research Topic 

The Element that Dominant Sustainable E-Commerce Purchasing: Malaysian Fashion Industry 

Why we choose this topic? 

    The reason behind this topic is to measure the online purchase intention in the Malaysia using the e-commerce platforms. Why we chose this title as our study is because the e-commence or social media platforms is a popular thing nowadays. Other people have different levels of satisfaction that they get. Not all the people are able to experience online shopping perfectly. Sometimes there will definitely be problems faced in terms of purchase buying behaviour. Therefore, we chose this title so that the authorized organization can improve which factors need to be fixed to better satisfy their customers.

Experience 

    About the experience, there is so much experience and knowledge that we gained from doing this research. Instead, this is our first-time experience an ongoing with this pandemic Covid-19 that radically transformed the lives of masses of people around the globe, including students. A lot of countries that are lockdown and has strict SOP (Standard Operating procedures) that happened in all country to execute from this virus spread. We are an ongoing online class than a physical class, it was so hard, but we managed to learn and do this research together. UniKL Business School provides us with good virtual learning using Microsoft Teams. It took a lot of time for us to adapt to this new environment of learning without seeing the lecturer face to face, but it will not take us down to know and gained all the knowledge.

Purpose/Main Objective 

    The main objective of this research is to examine the sustainable of e-commerce purchasing in Malaysian fashion industry. To determine the relationship between social media, influencer marketing, website and e-commerce and the element that dominant sustainable of e-commerce purchasing. 

Review of Previous Research to Solve the Problem

Dependent Variable 

• Online Purchase Intention 

      One of the intensive research areas in the existing literature was customer online purchase intention. The strength of a consumer's intention to carry out a specific purchasing behaviour via the Internet will be determined by their online purchase intention in the web-shopping environment (Salisbury et al., 2001). Meanwhile, Meskaran et al. (2014) defined online purchase intention as the customers' readiness to purchase through the Internet. 

Independent Variable 

• Social Media 

      Social media is a collective term for websites and applications that focus on communication, community -based input, interaction, content sharing and collaboration. Social media platforms have also been considered an effective source to emotionally motivate customers towards purchase intention and behaviour (Alnsour, 2018). Users on social media can issue their suggestions or opinions and use social media as a marketing tool to purchase customizations. These assist with creativity, open communication, and distribution of information between customers by using social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, and others (Jarrah, 2018). According to Xiang and Gretzel (2010), consumer-generated media is also known as social media. Social media platforms are known as internet -based applications with user -generated content that is typically relevant to the experience and shared online for easy access by other vulnerable users. 

• Influencer Marketing 

      Previous research by Barker (2019), they are frequently regarded as industry experts. They also have a fantastic relation with their fans. As a result of their popularity, they frequently have a sizable and loyal social media following. Influencer marketing is a hybrid of conventional and modern marketing strategies. They include a corporation teaming up with an online influencer to promote one of its products or services.

• Website 

  Websites are the key to the business's success and operate as the communication channel between businesses and customers (Chen et al., 2017; Kleinlercher et al., 2018). John Dewey (1910) have implemented five stages in which consumers go through when they are considered in buying decision. According to Jayani, Athapaththu & Kulathunga (2018), each buying decision stage provides consumers with relevant information for their buying and selling decision. Generally, a website is described as an information system that gives information to users. 

Problem Statement 

    In Malaysia, online fashion selling accounts for a significant portion of overall online sales. With the constant rise of the industry, most conventional merchants have understood that the internet will become a significant marketing medium (Tung, 2012). Since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic across the country, e-commence has become increasingly popular.

Research Objective & Research Question 

RO 1 – To determine the relationship between social media towards online      purchase
             intention in the Malaysian fashion industry.
RO 2 – To determine the relationship between influencer marketing towards online            
             purchase intention in the Malaysian fashion industry.
RO 3 – To determine the relationship between website towards online purchase
             intention in the Malaysian fashion industry.

RQ 1 – What is the relationship between social media towards online purchase      
             intention in the Malaysian fashion industry?
RQ 2 – What is the relationship between influencer marketing towards online 
             purchase intention in the Malaysian fashion industry?
RQ 3 – What is the relationship between website towards online purchase intention    
             in the Malaysian fashion industry?

The Model of Student Satisfaction in Higher Education 

    According to Meirani and Adrian (2018) & Alves & Raposo, (2007), the model framework's fundamental concept was that satisfaction benefits both the school and the student because a long-term friendship with the student meant ion, while an unhappy student meant ominous implications for both the university and the student. It about expectations and the quality perceived included the instructor, the technology used, course, material, and evaluation to the student. The model was evaluated using structural equations, and it revealed that the variable picture has the greatest effect on student satisfaction in higher education, followed by meaning, and finally content perceived. Furthermore, the study discovered that expectations had a negative effect on satisfaction.

Research Framework

Methodology 

    Research design is used as a strategy in implementing research projects that can assist research in collecting and analysing relevant data. To ensure that the data collected is valid and correct it is necessary to use a research design that has been set. This study refers to a quantitative approach using surveys to collect information related to online purchase intention of the customer in e-commerce Malaysian fashion industry. The research we conducted can help provide an overview of element that dominant of sustainable. The results of this study were analysed like using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) to analyse like demographic, reliability test, correlation, and regression meanwhile Smart Partial Least Squares (SmartPLS) using for modelling to check about relationship in all variables. 

Hypothesis Development 

1. Hypothesis 1: There is a positive relationship between social media and online purchase intention. 

2. Hypothesis 2: There is a positive relationship between influencer marketing and online purchase intention.

3. Hypothesis 3: There is a positive relationship between website and online purchase intention. 

Data Analysis 

    The demographic section consists of 4 questions about gender, age, race, and employment status. Data from the descriptive statistics shows that most of the respondents are female with a percentage of 53.8% (n=219) and male at 46.2% (n=188).

DEMOGRAPHIC FACTOR	CATEGORIES	FREQUENCY	PERCENTAGE (%)
GENDER	Male	188	46.2%
	Female	219	53.8%
	Total	407	100%
AGE	20 years and below	38	9.3%
	21-30 years old	285	70%
	31-40 years old	48	11.8%
	40 years and above	35	8.8%
	Total	407	100%
RACE	Malay	345	84.7%
	Chinese	29	7.2%
	Indian	17	4.1%
	Others	16	3.9%
	Total	407	100%
EMPLOYMENT STATUS	Student	182	44.7%
	Employed	199	48.9%
	Unemployed	26	6.4%
	Retired	0	0
	Total	407	100%

Table 1: Demographic Respondent Profile

• Reliability and Validity Analysis 

    In this study, Cronbach's Alpha reliability test was used to examine the questionnaire's reliability to ensure that each question used in the questionnaire has an acceptable consistency level. 

VARIABLE	NUMBER OF ITEM	CRONBACH’S ALPHA	INTERPRETATION
Social Media	5	0.851	Very Good reliability
Influencer Marketing	6	0.873	Very Good reliability
Website	5	0.842	Very Good reliability
Overall Total	16	0.849	Very Good reliability

Table 2: Description of the Cronbach Alpha of Independent Variable 

VARIABLE	NUMBER OF ITEM	CRONBACH’S ALPHA	INTERPRETATION
Online Purchase Intention	5	0.879	Very Good reliability

Table 3: Description of the Cronbach Alpha of Dependent Variable 

• Correlation Analysis 

      The correlation analysis result was shown in the table below. The result indicated a moderate correlation among the independent variables of the availability of influencer marketing and website, which is between (0.536) and (0.585), respectively. 

	Social Media	Influencer Marketing	Website	Online Purchase Intention
Social Media Pearson Corelation Sig. (2-tailed)	1	0.627	0.662	0.431
Influencer Marketing Pearson Corelation Sig. (2-tailed)	0.627	1	0.667	0.536
Website Pearson Corelation Sig. (2-tailed)	0.662	0.667	1	0.585
Online Purchase Intention Pearson Corelation Sig. (2-tailed)	0.431	0.536	0.585	1

Table 4: Correlation Analysis

Summary of Hypothesis Testing 

Hypothesis	Significant Value	Correlation Coefficient	Relationship Strength	Decision
Hypothesis 1: There is a positive relationship between social media and online purchase intention.	0.882	0.431	Moderate	Rejected
Hypothesis 2: There is a positive relationship between influencer marketing and online purchase intention.	0.000	0.536	Moderate	Accepted
Hypothesis 3: There is a positive relationship between website and online purchase intention.	0.000	0.585	Moderate	Accepted

Table 5: Summary of Hypothesis Testing

• Regression 

    Regression is a statistical method that helps analyse and understand the relationship between two or more interest variables. The process that is adapted to perform regression analysis helps to understand which factors are important, which factors can be ignored, and how they influence each other.

Model Summaryᵇ
Model	R	R Square	Adjusted R Square	Std. Error of the Estimate
1	.616ᵅ	.404	.375	.5855

            a. Predictors: (Constant), social media, Influencer Marketing, Website 

            b. Dependent Variable: Online Purchase Intention 

Table 6: Model Summaryᵇ

ANOVA
Model		Sum of Squares	Df	Mean Square	F	Sig.
1	Regression	76.884	3	25.628	74.759	.000b
	Residual	125.467	366	.343
	Total	202.351	369

            a. Dependent Variable: Online Purchase Intention 

            b. Predictors: (Constant), social media, Influencer Marketing, Website 

Table7: Summary of ANOVA

Coefficientsᶺ
Model		Unstandardized Coefficients		Standardized Coefficients	t	Sig.	Collinearity Statistics
		B	Std. Error	Beta			Tolerance	VIF
1	(Constant)	0.701	.239		.928	.004
	Social Media	-.011-	.074	-.009-	-.149-	.882	0.5	2.001
	Influencer Marketing	.319	0.07	.266	4.533	0	.494	2.026
	Website	.474	0.07	.413	6.78	0	.457	2.19

Table 8: Summary of Coefficients

    

Smart-PLS Prediction Model 

      The first model presented with a direct path from influencer marketing, social media, and website. All variables are significant at the p-value, 0.000, and the path coefficient of 0.037, 0.286, and 0.379, respectively. At this point, no indirect effect was hypothesized or evaluated. Based on Figure 5 above, website contribute the highest with 0.379 to the relationship of online purchase intention. The items inside the website, contributing most towards being the highest relationship, are W5, W1, and W4. The models had:

I. a direct path from website to online purchase intention.

II. a direct path from the social media to online purchase intention.

III. a direct path from influencer marketing to online purchase intention. 

Conclusion 

    In conclusion, we can conclude that we achieve the objective of our research which is to determine the relationship between social media, and website towards online purchase intention in the Malaysian fashion industry. Every people have different perspectives in shopping online. Therefore, the hypothesis of this study is there is significant relationship between social media, and website towards online purchase intention in the Malaysian fashion industry. Thus, have two hypotheses are accepted and only for the hypotheses 1 are not accepted. However, during this pandemic Covid-19 era, most people as the respondent cannot do face-to-face survey during to the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) by the Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia but it everyone may remain at home unless there is necessary to go out or run errands. It is not a barrier to obtaining accurate data. So, the best method is to use all social sites to get the required number of respondents. From this idea, can be identify the respondent’s data are match the questions perfectly also can make the respondent understand because for sure they closed with social media. Despite, using Malaysia population for the data collection and for better result is focusing person using social media in entire Malaysia where can make the data bigger and can differentiate the answer also identify the problem.

     From our results, the elements we found were social media, and websites towards online shopping intentions in the Malaysian fashion industry. The effectiveness of online shopping intentions can support the fashion industry. Overall, the hypotheses are the same. However, this research exploring the whole area of Malaysia has been the target for investigation. To conclude, online shopping has a huge role in the fashion industry, most of the fashion also allows a person to see their appearance and increase confidence for themselves. It also allows individuals to maintain comfort even if they are different from others and come from different cultures. Finally, believe it or not, it is impossible the fashion industry should miss out on the habit’s top choice of online shopping.