Diagnosis for the adoption of e-commerce platforms in micro and small enterprises in rural areas: Case study of the region of Río Cuarto, Alajuela

The implementation of electronic commerce as a new way of commercialization is not only a business decision, since not all companies, nor all consumers in a region are technologically prepared to adopt electronic commerce. To implement this type of trade, companies should carry out a diagnostic study, both to know if they have the technological resources internally, and to diagnose if their potential clients also have such preparation. From this perspective, this work seeks to design an instrument that allows diagnosing the technological preparation and acceptance of micro and small businesses, and their potential consumers in rural areas. For the elaboration of the instruments, an iterative process was used, composed of three iterations of design and evaluation. Academic experts with extensive experience in instrument design carried out the first evaluation; the second iteration was evaluated in a pilot field study where 6 companies and 10 consumers from regions such as Pococí and San Carlos participated. Finally, the third iteration was developed with a case study in the canton of Río Cuarto de Alajuela, 29 companies and 261 consumers from the region participated in this study. The diagnosis highlights that most of these companies state that they are not technologically prepared to implement e-commerce, while most of the participating consumers indicate that they do feel technologically prepared to use these platforms.