Escolha de fontes de informações na busca externa pré-compra de produtos e serviços: um estudo sobre o comportamento do consumidor no contexto da superprodução de informação

摘要

The rapid technological innovations of the recent years implicate, among other factors, an increasing volume of information spread in the physical and the online environments. From the consumer's perspective, once intending to buy a product or service, the decision of what to buy involves, previously, choosing which sources to use in search for information that might help the decision making process. The present study aimed to understand how consumers choose their information sources in pre-purchase external search regarding products and services given the information overproduction context. It was identified as a theoretical gap, understanding the external search associated with this scenarios and, on the other hand, applying concepts related to the information overproduction problem focusing the external search, specially concerning the choice of sources in the integrated offline/online environment. Applying the qualitative method of research, in-depth interviews were conducted, until saturation, with twelve consumers residents of varied cities; the collected data was analyzed using the content analysis technique, and the results were summarized through a framework, defined as a set of linked concepts which allow a comprehensive understanding of a phenomenon, answering the question under investigation. According to the presented framework concerning the choice of information sources in pre-purchase external search regarding products and services, (i) consumers may use different sources of information from the offline environment, from the online environment, or both, and the choice of sources to be used tend to be extended from the external search to the evaluation of alternatives; (ii) there may exist variations of the behavior due to the characteristics of the decision problem, the individual characteristics (including previous knowledge accessed through internal search), and due to the social context (referring to the consumer's social circle); (iii) the choice occurs based on pre-established evaluation criteria, related to the primary objectives in decision making (including minimizing cognitive effort and also the physical effort, both related to wasting no time); (iv) among these criteria, experience of confusion or e-confusion (related to the purchasing object or to the source of information) may be taken into account; (v) the evaluation may involve the use of common heuristics, expressed through socialized images regarding different sources; and (vi) along the process, consumers build preferences, which operate in their following choices of information sources to be used. Focusing the increasing availability of offline and online information sources disperse in the consumption universe, the conclusion was that, even in this scenarios, consumers tend to take into consideration few sources to search for pre-purchase information and, once intending to buy a product or service, they rely on a previously built perception of which sources are more, or less, appropriate to be consulted. Considering the academic and managerial relevance of the study, since it regards a topic that is presently being discussed within the academy and has possible applications in the market, its contributions were pointed out, as well as its limitations along with suggestions for future research on the investigated matter.