Transaction Orientation vs. Relationship Orientation: Consumer Logic of Enterprise Digital Empowerment

It is an important channel for traditional and Internet enterprises to improve the market competitiveness by employing digital technologies in order to realize consumer empowerment nowadays. However, few researches focus on consumer perspective which is based on the enterprise digital empowerment. Here we present a qualitative case study method to compare the differences in empowering consumers during digital empowerment between two house decoration companies by adopting three dimensions of empowerment process (structural, psychological, and resource empowerments). Two empowerment models are derived — the traditional enterprise’s vertical-empowerment model (building online Internet platform and offline store) and Internet enterprise’s horizontal-empowerment model (only developing resource integration platforms) depicting the process of empowering the consumer. Based on these two models, we further illustrate the digital empowerment for consumer by introducing transaction and relationship marketing theory. This study complements the empowerment literature where it lacks theoretical basis and comparative studies. For instance, through uncovering the consumer perspective, traditional enterprises can have a better understanding of how to transform itself the digital way and also be insightful for Internet enterprises.