The more specific the information, the better. These are the useful statistics for businesses. Yet last time I bought a toaster, I searched for information on the Internet before I went shopping. Government, however, has a need to know what percentage of the US GDP is being sold over the net, because much of it is escaping state sales tax. What e-commerce really is, in a broad sense, is simply a new way of delivering information.
Transaction data is but a tiny fraction of the actual purchasing process.