Weathers et al. (2007) took a slightly different view of the search/experience distinction.
They based classification on the extent to which consumers feel they need to directly
experience goods to evaluate quality.
For experience goods, consumers need to directly experience goods to evaluate quality, examples include apparels and musical instruments.
For search goods, consumers can make judgment of the quality depending on second-hand information, examples include books and CDs.
In online markets, due to the spatial separation product can only be evaluated online when a
buyer is making a purchase decision.
Buyer can relatively easily evaluate search goods, but it is difficult to evaluate experience goods when making the purchase decision.
They may have different risk perception for search and experience goods.
Thus, it is reasonable to believe that product type may influence the buyer’s perceived
risk for a BIN transaction.