Survey: More women than men shopping online

More women than men are shopping online, and making purchases more frequently over the Internet, showed the latest survey on online shopping habits issued by MasterCard here on Monday.

The report, which surveyed 4157 respondents across Australia, Chinese mainland, China's Hong Kong, India, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Thailand, showed that 78 percent of all women surveyed had shopped online, and that women shoppers comprised 57 percent of those who had shopped six times or more over a period of three months.

It also showed that price/value was the top consideration in terms of making an online purchase. In fact, of the 61 percent of women who admitted to shopping impulsively online, the substantial discounts and lower prices found online were often the trigger for this.

Seventy-five percent of female consumers who had shopped on impulse did so because of the lower prices, while 49 percent were attracted by the uniqueness of products which were only available online.

The products frequently purchased by female consumers included ladies' clothing or accessories, books and arts and cosmetics, said the survey.

While female consumers were shown to be more prone to impulse shopping, a slightly higher number of male shoppers were surprisingly more planned with their purchases.

The survey showed that 85 percent of male shoppers had conducted some research prior to their online purchase, compared to 82 percent of female shoppers.

In addition, male shoppers are spending more on their online purchases. Seventy-nine percent of men spent more than 100 U.S. dollars on online shopping over a period of three months compared to 72 percent of women shoppers surveyed.

This is possibly due to the types of products men purchase online, said the survey. Men were shopping for home appliances and electronic products, CDs/DVDs/VCDs and books and arts.