The Factors Affecting the E-commerce Adoption in SMEs in the Industrial Towns of Zanjan-Iran: Managers` Perspectives

Today, small and medium-sized enterprises have a large share in the industrial activities at various countries of the world. Also, small and medium-sized enterprises in the industrial towns of Zanjan have a significant share of industrial production. Currently, these firms have many structural, legal, technological, financial, and other problems and are not able to produce competitive products in world’s markets. It seems that e-commerce is one of the strategies to improve the status of these firms to compete in global markets.This study aimed to provide a comprehensive insight into the factors affecting the adoption process of electronic commerce by small and medium-sized enterprises. The researches show that factors such as Intensity of competition, organizational characteristics, strategic orientation, innovation, managers’ features, and information technology in small and medium-sized enterprises affect the e-commerce adoption. Hence, the relationship between these variables and adoption of e-commerce was examined in terms of research hypotheses. This study was a descriptive – survey research. The data was collected from the library and researcher-made questionnaire. Pearson correlation and Kendall Tao tests were used to determine the significance of the relationship between predictor and criterion variables. Also, regression, Friedman, and some other tests were used for obtaining other results.The results indicate that there is significant relationship between organizational characteristics, strategic orientation, level of innovation, characteristics of managers, information technology, and e-commerce adoption. The results of this study can be used by the managers of industrial towns at Zanjan, directors and managers of these firms for promoting the adoption of e-commerce in the region, managers of small and medium-sized enterprises, and managers of other industrial towns of Iran.