These influences include his/her motivations, his/her needs along with the benefits and costs of using e-commerce, recommendations, word of mouth, advertising, brand, his/her own experiences of interacting with off-line business channels of that and other organisations, and so on. These influences play a vital role in his/her decision about which Web site to visit and whether to make a purchase on that site.
The next three stages of a customer’s interaction with an e¬commerce environment constitute a service encounter a prepurchase stage; an e-purchase stage; and finally a postpurchase stage. During the prepurchase stage, the customer chooses a Web site, searches for a product or service and makes a decision about whether to make a purchase. This decision is based on the usability of the home page and other Web pages of this site, information provided about the product or service, the price, the credibility of the Web site, the delivery mechanisms and refunds policy, and so forth.