Websites as Information Hubs: How Informational Channel Integration and Shopping Benefit Density Interact in Steering Customers to the Physical Store

Abstract

Multichannel retailers aim to steer customers to physical stores in order to increase cross-selling, benefit from higher margins, and offer multisensory experiences. The question of how retailers can steer customers to strategically important channels remains. We propose that retailers may induce customers to switch to physical stores by communicating information about channel integration on their websites and that this explicit communication is influenced by the implicit communication of shopping benefits of which customers and retailers may not be aware. Using a multilevel and multisource approach with field data on 1,479 customers and 104 firms, we find that informational online-to-physical channel integration on a retailer’s website influences customers’ online-to-physical store switching and that the density of concurrently communicated shopping benefits moderates this effect. Our results extend the literature on channel choice and provide implications for retailers regarding how to design websites as information hubs to steer customers to physical stores.