A Parsimonious Two-Segment Structure in Smartphone E-Commerce: Evidence from Romanian University Students

Online shopping is expanding rapidly in emerging European markets, yet many consumers still combine digital channels with offline verification. This study asks whether the resulting heterogeneity among young consumers is genuinely complex or reducible to a simpler structure. Drawing on technology-acceptance and perceived-risk perspectives, it analyses survey data from 457 Romanian university students, of whom 269 were routed to eight attitudinal items on online smartphone purchasing. The questionnaire was distributed to students at two Romanian universities through institutional email and faculty social media accounts, yielding a non-probability convenience sample; no probability-based selection procedure was applied. After examining the dimensionality and reliability of the items through exploratory factor analysis, K-means clustering was used to segment respondents, and the solution was checked against hierarchical clustering. Two segments emerged: cautious, lower-online-orientation consumers, who report lower perceived convenience, speed, price advantage, and overall use of online purchasing, and online-oriented adopters, who view digital channels as efficient and convenient. Rather than many fine-grained segments, the data point to a dominant behavioural axis, namely overall orientation towards online purchasing. The findings provide evidence consistent with a parsimonious two-segment account of consumer heterogeneity in a rapidly developing digital market, and they suggest differentiated omnichannel strategies: confidence-building and risk-reduction measures for cautious consumers and experience optimisation for digital adopters.