An investigation of e-marketing and its effect on the consumer buying decision during COVID-19 pandemic in Aceh Province, Indonesia: A mediating role of perceived risk

Today, Coronavirus is a pandemic that has spread worldwide and causes many problems, including socio economic problems in society. Therefore, e-marketing has an essential function in acquiring new customers, generating leads, and generating revenue for your business by reaching customers interested in your products and services. A digital platform such as web marketing is online marketing to prospective leads and high-value consumers. Thus, the present study examined the usage of e-marketing as a model for buying decisions moderated by perceived risk during the covid-19 pandemic in Aceh Province, Indonesia. This quantitative study involved 325 respondents and was collected through a survey by filling out the questionnaires. Also, e-marketing is measured by perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use as exogenous variables. Therefore, perceived risk is a mediating variable, and the consumer buying decision is an endogenous variable. The data were analyzed using Structural Equation Modelling – Analysis of Moments Structure (SEM-AMOS). The results showed that e-marketing (perceived usefulness and ease of use) positively and significantly affects consumer buying decisions. This study also applied the Sobel test and indicated that perceived risk mediates perceived usefulness and ease toward consumer buying decisions. In conclusion, this study has successfully examined the relationship between e-marketing via perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use. Also, it proves that perceived risk plays a mediating role (partial mediator) in the relationship of perceived usefulness and ease of use on consumer buying decisions. This tested model has become a formulation, especially in marketing science, where it turns out that during the covid-19 pandemic, the buying decision model in the marketplace is a function of the perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of consumers towards the marketplace, as well as the perceived risk of the marketplace as a partial mediator. So that marketplace manufacturers can drive consumer buying decisions by consumers by creating a strengthening of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use for consumers, thereby affecting consumers' perceived risk and impacting their buying decisions.