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Given the rate of growth in online grocery shopping revenues, retailers and manufacturers need to understand how consumers behave when shopping online (Anesbury et al., 2016). Thus, categorising customers into groups according to typical elements of their customer behaviour is important both in terms of increasing knowledge about customer behaviour from a scientific perspective and in the development of, for example, companies’ marketing strategies. In fact, by dividing customers according to an appropriate segmentation, a company can divide its market into several suitable segments in which customers have similar characteristics and needs and which it is effective to target. This paper focuses on the domain of customer segmentation and specifically on the field of online grocery shopping, which has been one of the fastest-growing online categories in recent years around the world.

Tourism is responsible for the movement of people worldwide, and the tourism industry has an enormous contribution to the global economy (Toral-Granda et al., 2017). According to World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC, 2019), the tourism industry contributed 10.4% of the world’s service sector’s GDP and generated 319 million jobs, or 10% of total employment, in 2018. However, tourism is also one of the largest environmental resource consumers, accounting for nearly 5% of global CO2 emissions (UNTWO, 2017). Furthermore, environmentally friendly activities such as responsible tourism, sustainable tourism, and ecotourism improve local people’s quality of life and minimize environmental problems (Caruana et al., 2014). Therefore, it is necessary to emphasize environmentally friendly tourism activities.

The hotel industry has turned out to be one of the most competitive industries in the world. The competition among hotels forced them to increase the quality of services and improve the relationship with customers. Today business development is fast (Wijaya et al., 2021), and hotels require to deal with ongoing monitoring across a variety of service areas in order to improve the services at the best levels. The service quality is known as a fundamental determinant in differentiating service providers (Mey et al., 2006). It is an important element in customers’ initial decision-making, and their return intention. However, in today’s business world, hotels may face major challenges, such as frequent changes in customers’ preferences, and demands that are more complex. Therefore, there is room for this question of whether the perceived service quality is a sufficient stimulant to retain a relationship in a long term?

E-commerce is one of the modern trends that is emerging in connection with the development of information technology. Turban et al. (2015) state that e-commerce is a form of business that uses an online environment, and the Internet is just a factor that connects the seller and the buyer. The fast growth of e-commerce in the last few years in most European countries (Eurostat, 2020) brings pressure on companies and the necessity for rapid responses to increasing customer requirements. The reason is simple. Many companies face challenges, such as high competition in some segments of e-commerce, gradual market saturation due to economic growth and development. The shopping behaviour of customers in the e-commerce environment is different from customer behaviour in the traditional setting due to remote access. For e-commerce customers, personalization of services and interactivity are vital (Bucko, 2018).

The development and innovations of technology has paved the way for the expanding growth of an innovative form of commerce based on a principle of shared access of assets or resources rather than private ownership (Basukie et al., 2020). Although to date, there has been no agreement on the naming or definition of this socio-economic phenomenon (Martínez-González et al., 2021), it has quickly changed consumers’ preferences and inclinations. People around the world embark on digital interaction and temporarily Exchange their under-utilized possessions, resources, time and skills, facilitated through internet platforms (Leoni & Parker, 2019). According to the European Commission (2018), the size of this new economy relative to the total EU economy was estimated to be 26.5 billion EUR in 2016, offering about 394,000 jobs across the EU.

The interaction of two phenomena is observed in well-developed countries, i.e. the growing importance of the service sector (transition to the service economy or the post-industrial society) and the increasing importance of knowledge, manifested in the creation of innovations (knowledge-based economy). We live in an era when the skills of acquiring and processing information as well as creating innovations remain the key factor responsible for the market success of businesses. As indicated by Škare and Tomić (2014), the market position of enterprises, their further development and prosperity largely depend on their opening towards innovations (Burns & Stalker, 1961; Weerawardena & Mavondo, 2011; Baily et al., 2006; Sandvik et al., 2014). The very idea of innovation was actually born in industry, however, the transition of the economic system to the one where services play a dominant or at least an equal role, resulted in the phenomenon of innovation spreading in the service sector as well (Schumpeter, 1934; Swann, 2009; Hjalager, 2010).

Integrated marketing communication is an arrangement by which organizations organize their online and offline marketing communication tools to provide a clear, consistent, trusted, and competitive message about an organization and its offer (Fahy & Jobber, 2019). Organizations aim at attracting the target customers and communicating the value of the product (brand) to them clearly and convincingly (Kotler & Armstrong, 2018). Modern communication technologies and approaches nowadays allow customers a much higher level of information availability, so potential and loyal customers regularly check the quality of all organizations and choose the best offers for themselves according to the recommendations of their acquaintances, friends, or discussion forums (Petrů et al., 2020). Despite the large increase in the use of personal communication due to Internet penetration, advertising in mixture with other marketing communication tools has a substantial impact on consumer interest, brand building, and sales. Advertising is considered a positive as well as a negative element in society (Copley, 2004).

The purpose of this article is to identify the factors that have a decisive influence on the level of satisfaction of users of FinTech services in Romania. To explain the variables that have an effect, we conducted this study both in the entire population of FinTech users, as well as differentiated into two distinct generations: Millennials and Generation Z. From the point of view of age ranges, consumers in the Millennials category are also known in the specialty literature (Aichner & Shaltoni, 2019) as Generation Y, that are people born between the 1980s and the mid-1990s. According to Bucovetchi et al. (2019), Generation Z is the demographic cohort following Millennials and is made up of those born between the second half of the 1990s and early 2000s. These two generations have different behaviors, priorities and preferences when it comes to the use of information technologies.

In the current economy, there are some heavily regulated markets, such as the tobacco market, and others on the point of being regulated – markets using fossil combustibles, such as the combustion engine vehicles, as well as the gambling sector. Those markets operate with products or services in some way prejudicial to health and the environment. This fact justifies before the citizens the governmental intervention. Companies operating on those markets have very limited their marketing strategies to promote sells (Henriksen, 2012). In this article, we aim to investigate the options faced by companies for the implementation of marketing strategies that will permit them to scale their sales leadership position once the market is regulated. In the case of the tobacco market, the motivation to regulate emerges due to the causal link between tobacco consumption and several types of cancer, cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, reproductive disorders, Alzheimer’s disease (López-Arrieta & Sanz, 2001), and many other negative health consequences. In addition, it has an addictive nature (DHSS, 2004).

Social media (SM) has become one of the largest environments of human interaction. Growth in social network use is evident in developed countries, and to an even greater extent in developing countries (Internet World Stats, 2020). In 2019, 53% of EU enterprises used at least one type of SM and 86% of these used SM to build their image and market their products. Additionally, more than 54% of the people (16–74 years old) living in the EU used the Internet for participating in social networks (Eurostat, 2020a, b). DESI (2020) found that over 65% of all EU citizens use at least one form of SM, the most popular being Facebook and Instagram, especially among young people. Consequently, as the use of SM becomes increasingly common, companies seek to reach and interact with current and potential customers through SM platforms (Shanahan et al., 2019; Wang & Kim, 2017).