The Research of Drivers and Barriers While Shopping in Social Commerce Based on the Example of Avito

The development of Internet technologies in Russia and the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic contributed to the development of the e-commerce market. Today, shoppers use not only traditional e-commerce channels to shop, but also social commerce channels, which include classified ad services, social networks, instant messengers and other P2P platforms. In 2020, sales on classified ad services such as Avito and Yula accounted for 33% of social commerce sales. In social commerce, a consumer-oriented environment has been formed, so the relevance of the study lies in the need to study user drivers and barriers to building customer-oriented relationships. Practical relevance also lies in the need for Avito to track and study drivers and barriers in a situation of growing competition in the market. The purpose of this study is to identify drivers and barriers for Avito users when making purchases and to form practical recommendations for the company. To achieve this goal, in the first chapter, an analysis of academic literature and scientific articles studying the phenomenon of social commerce was carried out in order to form the conceptual apparatus of the study, as well as to study existing approaches to identifying drivers and barriers when making purchases using social commerce channels. In the second chapter, an analysis of market trends and consumer behavior in the field of social commerce in Russia was carried out, a description of Avito's position in the Russian C2C trade market was presented, trends in the development of the C2C market and the behavior of the target audience were outlined. The third chapter presents the methodology and results of a study based on the qual-QUAN design. 435 respondents took part in a quantitative study, but further analysis used the answers of 343 respondents selected according to the criterion of using Avito over the past year. The results of factorial and regression analysis are also presented here. Groups of drivers containing various characteristics have been described and named as "Platform", "Social components", "Convenience and benefit", "Sustainability". Barrier groups are a set of characteristics grouped together in "Security and privacy", "Trust", "No convenient meeting place". The group of factors "Subjective attitude to Avito" cannot be unambiguously attributed to drivers or barriers. Regression analysis revealed a connection between the intention to use, purchase and recommendation with such factors as "Subjective attitude towards Avito", "Convenience and benefit", "Platform" and "No convenient meeting place". Based on the results of the study, a list of recommendations for Avito was developed.