An Analysis of the Effects of Consumers’ Online and Offline Activities on Webrooming: Focusing on Motivations for Using Mobile Shopping Apps for Health and Beauty Products*

Purpose: As competition among retailers intensifies and the strategic management of distribution channels becomes increasingly important, understanding consumers’ omnichannel shopping motivations has become an essential factor in establishing effective retail channel strategies. Previous research in retail channels has attempted to identify the motivations influencing consumers’ preferences for specific channels and their cross-channel behaviors. However, there remains a need for broader and more comprehensive studies on shopping motivations related to both online and offline channel choices. In the health and beauty (H&B) market, which encompasses a wide range of product categories, retailers are expanding their customer touchpoints through omnichannel strategies based on mobile apps. At the same time, consumers are gaining greater access to H&B products and services as opportunities to receive personalized services through shopping apps continue to expand. Accordingly, this study examines consumers’ motivations for using mobile shopping apps within a theoretical framework, focusing on the rapidly growing H&B industry, and analyzes how these usage motivations influence consumers’ webrooming behavior. Research design, data, and methodology: In this study, panel big data obtained from a marketing research firm were employed to examine the effects of consumers’ mobile shopping app usage motivations on webrooming behavior. The dataset comprises mobile app usage records, location data, and in-store transaction amounts from consumer panels residing in Korea, collected between 2022 and 2023. Based on these data, Brand O, which has recently demonstrated notable growth and market share within Korea’s H&B market, was selected as the focal brand for analysis. To measure consumers’ motivations for using mobile shopping apps, additional survey data were utilized. Measurement items from the extended unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT2) framework were adopted to assess factors that may influence consumers’ behavioral intentions toward mobile app usage. The survey data, which included 1,194 consumers who had experienced Brand O both online and offline, were linked to each respondent’s actual shopping activity data via consumer panel IDs. To examine the webrooming effects of consumers’ H&B brand shopping app usage motivations, while addressing potential endogeneity among in-store shopping time, mobile app usage time, and total purchase amount, this study employed a two-stage least squares (2SLS) estimation approach. The independent variables influencing the dependent variable (i.e., total purchase amount) were mobile app usage time and in-store shopping time, and control variables included consumers’ age, income level, and self-reported frequency of cosmetics shopping. The endogenous independent variables were instrumented using factor scores derived from UTAUT2-based app usage motivation constructs. Results: The 2SLS estimation results indicate that consumers who use mobile apps for more efficient shopping (i.e., performance expectancy) tend to spend more time using H&B brand apps. Similarly, consumers who derive enjoyment and fun from using shopping apps (i.e., hedonic motivation) or who habitually use shopping apps during their shopping activities (i.e., habit factor) also exhibit increased H&B brand app usage time. These findings suggest that, when consumers’ shopping motivations are broadly classified into goal-oriented utilitarian motivations and experience-based hedonic motivations, mobile shopping app usage is influenced by both performance expectancy and hedonic motivation. Regarding the second-stage outcome of total purchase amount, increased H&B shopping app usage time was found to have a significant positive effect on consumers’ in-store spending. These results highlight the need for webrooming strategies that enable H&B stores to stimulate in-store purchases through mobile shopping apps. Based on the endogeneity test results, our study further analyzed the webrooming effects of consumers’ H&B shopping app usage motivations and app usage time using a regression model. By including interaction terms between consumers’ shopping app usage motivations and app usage time, the analysis examined which types of shopping app motivations significantly moderate the effect of app usage time on total purchase amount. The results show that H&B shopping app usage time increases with consumers’ performance expectancy, facilitating conditions, hedonic motivation, and habit factors. Furthermore, increased app usage time has a significant positive effect on consumers’ in-store purchase amounts, and consumers whose shopping app use is primarily driven by effort expectancy and hedonic motivation were also found to make higher purchase amounts at H&B stores. Conclusions: This study employed the UTAUT2 framework, which has been widely applied to examine consumers’ technology acceptance behaviors, as a theoretical model to understand consumers’ webrooming behavior via mobile shopping apps from a retail marketing perspective. The analysis revealed that H&B consumers’ shopping app usage time is significantly influenced by performance expectancy, facilitating conditions, hedonic motivation, and habitual factors among the UTAUT2 constructs. These findings suggest that H&B brands considering the launch of mobile shopping apps should design user-friendly applications that facilitate efficient and convenient product search, while being easy to install and use. The results also indicate that H&B mobile shopping app usage can enhance consumers’ actual in-store purchase amounts, demonstrating a webrooming effect. In this process, webrooming behavior is strengthened when app usage is associated not only with perceived ease of use but also with hedonic motivation. H&B stores need to adopt personalized marketing strategies by providing real-time updates on in-store promotions and available coupons for visiting shoppers, along with convenience-driven services such as location-based store guides through mobile apps. The usability and enjoyment offered by mobile channels that enable direct user interaction are expected to further stimulate consumers’ webrooming behavior in shopping apps.