Customer perceptions and attitudes towards the subscription business model in online shopping

The aim of this qualification thesis is to research and assess customer perceptions and attitudes towards the subscription business model in e-commerce shopping on the Czech market which they take towards specific situations during the use of a subscription service. A sub-objective is also the description of specific advantages, disadvantages, and potential risks. The introductory section of the thesis focuses on the circumstances that lead to the regular use of subscriptions, presents the historical development of subscriptions, and furthermore, presents the subscriptions typology that the customers may encounter on the Internet today. The following section presents the customer’s role in the subscription purchasing process, and the theoretical benefits for companies and customers which are further extended by the topic of customer subscription management. The key factors that customers perceive regarding the acquisition and subsequent utilization of subscription services are assessed and identified by the quantitative research based on the in-depth interviews and encoding method. To ascertain potential connections between the identified factors and their potential impact on the overall perception of the subscription business model, frequency and cross-sectional analysis are employed to scrutinize data gathered through the questionnaire survey. The collected data serve as the basis for the definition of six different types of subscribers in the Czech market.