What Makes or Breaks an Immersive Online Customer Journey? Digital Native Generation Z Customers’ Experiences

Abstract

Customers may lose awareness of time and their surroundings during online shopping, signaling an immersive experience. Despite the widespread use of everyday digital technologies, it remains unclear at which stage of the customer journey immersion is born or broken—and why. This study addresses that gap by exploring how and why individuals become immersed in online shopping. Data were collected through 33 semi-structured interviews with Finnish digital natives belonging Generation Z who had experienced online shopping immersion. The findings identify seven fostering factors for online shopping immersion: motivation towards products, intentional product search, external impulses, captivating product loop, intense concentration on products, high-quality product visualization and need to collect all the information. On the other hand, four interrupting factors are presented: external distractions, technological issues, fatigue and transaction.