Consumer Characteristics’ Influence on Level of E-Commerce Consumption

Much of the scientific literature analyzes use of e-commerce under normal conditions - how e-commerce improves consumer welfare with its undeniable benefits, including a lower cost structure, more flexibility, wider scope and scale of services, greater transparency, and faster transactions (Kabango and Asa, 2015; Huang CC et al., 2020). However, this approach is losing its relevance in light of the new reality into which the pandemic that began in the first quarter of 2020 has brought us. Currently, the pandemic has developed into a difficult situation for the whole world, which affects the economy in general and e-commerce trends in particular (Nakhate et al., 2020; Whiteford, 2020). It should be noted that in Russia there were no such strict restrictions and strict quarantine in comparison with other countries. This leads us to speculate about why the COVID-19 crisis has so impacted the growth of e-commerce. Obviously, this is not only a matter of self-isolation as a restriction for purchases in offline stores, since the growth of e-commerce continued after the easing of restrictions associated with the epidemiological situation. This can be explained by the transformation of values and lifestyles under the influence of situational influence (crisis). The purpose of this study: to identify the factors affecting the likelihood of falling into different groups of consumers, depending on the degree of use of e-commerce. The practical significance of this study lies in the fact that based on the results of the study, it will be possible to draw a conclusion about the buyer profile of each of the three consumer groups, as well as on the basis of the identified mechanisms of influence to influence consumers, contributing to an increase in the penetration of the e-commerce channel. The data set provided by the SKOLKOVO-RES Center for Financial Technologies and Digital Economy Research was taken as an information base for the study.