Meaning or Importance? E-commerce Consumers Interest in Product Features Presented in Online Offerings: The Role of Self-Relevance and Information Processing

Abstract Gaining and responding to consumer interest in offered products is critical in e-commerce communication. When exposed to product-attribute information, e-commerce consumers may be interested in the meaning or importance of the presented attributes. Two online experiments with Polish young adults demonstrate that consumer interest in those types of information is related to product self-relevance (i.e., whether consumers consider buying a product for themselves vs. they are merely evaluating the product). Namely, in the high (vs. low) self-relevance condition, consumers are less interested in importance-type information (i.e., they seek it less from consultants and retrieve it less from their knowledge while sharing their opinions online). Moreover, in the high (vs. low) self-relevance condition, consumers retrieve more meaning-type information while sharing opinions online. Additionally, consumers sharing online opinions retrieve more importance-type information when processing more analytically. The above findings extend the existing literature by linking product self-relevance and information processing with e-commerce consumer interest in product information. The results may be helpful for e-commerce marketers and managers who aim to gain and respond to consumer interest in specific types of product information.