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Revision with unchanged content. German E-commerce is well-off; an average growth in revenue of 17% in the first half of 2005 implies much better market conditions than the traditional retail business has experienced. Nevertheless numerous online shops are struggling with increasing competition and shop shutdowns appear as frequent as openings. Consequently it is the objective of most online shops to motivate consumers to purchase. Due to the fact that many online shops fail to accomplish this objective, this study intends to investigate which characteristics online shops have to provide in order be chosen by consumers. To investigate this issue the author has conducted a survey with two research questions: - What characteristics of online shops are potential choice criteria from the consumer s perspective? - Which choice criteria are the most fundamental success factors?

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was born in 1981 in Cologne. After High School hestudied International- and European BusinessAdminstration at the University of Maastricht andthe Cologne Business School. In September 2003he founded the online shop teppichversand24.de,which is now one of Germany s leading onlinebusinesses for carpets and rugs.

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