PROVIDING INFORMATION AND ENABLING TRANSACTIONS: WHICH WEBSITE FUNCTION IS MORE IMPORTANT FOR SUCCESS?

In this study, we propose and test a chain of effects from website content, through informational and transactional success to overall website success and company performance. This framework enables us to determine the relative importance of the informational and transaction-related website functions for website success, and to show how website functions, through a number of intermediate performance measures, contribute to the financial performance of a company. The results are based on an empirical study of 380 companies across a wide range of industries. We find that both the informational and the transaction-related website functions have a significant positive impact on website success, but that the impact of the informational function is considerably larger. Our results show that firms can improve website performance through providing relevant website functions throughout the entire customer purchase process. An important result of our study concerns the mediating role of customer performance: customer performance in terms of e.g., customer satisfaction and retention, is a necessary condition for website success to result in financial performance. The chain of effects shows that firms profit from websites that are designed to meet customer needs and wants.

[1]  Jacob Cohen.  Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences , 1969, The SAGE Encyclopedia of Research Design.

[2]  J. Howard.  Consumer behavior : application of theory / John A. Howard , 1977 .

[3]  C. Fornell,et al.  Evaluating structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error. , 1981 .

[4]  Blake Ives,et al.  The information system as a competitive weapon , 1984, CACM.

[5]  Gregory G. Dess,et al.  Measuring organizational performance in the absence of objective measures: The case of the privately-held firm and conglomerate business unit , 1984 .

[6]  N. Venkatraman,et al.  Measurement of Business Economic Performance: An Examination of Method Convergence , 1987 .

[7]  R. Mason,et al.  Can information technology revitalize your customer service , 1990 .

[8]  Ephraim R. McLean,et al.  Information Systems Success: The Quest for the Dependent Variable , 1992, Inf. Syst. Res..

[9]  A. Parasuraman,et al.  Reassessment of Expectations as a Comparison Standard in Measuring Service Quality: Implications for Further Research , 1994 .

[10]  James R. Brown,et al.  Interdependency, Contracting, and Relational Behavior in Marketing Channels , 1996 .

[11]  Wynne W. Chin.  The partial least squares approach for structural equation modeling. , 1998 .

[12]  John Hulland,et al.  Use of partial least squares (PLS) in strategic management research: a review of four recent studies , 1999 .

[13]  John Benamati,et al.  Differences in Public Web Sites: The Current State of Large U. S. Firms , 2000, J. Electron. Commer. Res..

[14]  Andrew Whinston,et al.  Measures for e-business value assessment , 2001 .

[15]  Paul Alpar,et al.  Measuring the Efficiency of Web Site Traffic Generation , 2001, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[16]  Monica Perry,et al.  Fortune 500 manufacturer web sites: Innovative marketing strategies or cyberbrochures? , 2002 .

[17]  E. Huizingh.  Towards Successful E-Business Strategies: A Hierarchy of Three Management Models , 2002 .

[18]  M. Dekimpe,et al.  The Market Valuation of Internet Channel Additions , 2002 .

[19]  Kenneth L. Kraemer,et al.  e-Commerce Metrics for Net-Enhanced Organizations: Assessing the Value of e-Commerce to Firm Performance in the Manufacturing Sector , 2002, Inf. Syst. Res..

[20]  Wayne D. Hoyer,et al.  Service Orientation of a Retailer's Business Strategy: Dimensions, Antecedents, and Performance Outcomes , 2002 .

[21]  Inge Geyskens,et al.  How cannibalistic is the internet channel? A study of the newspaper industry in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands , 2002 .

[22]  Ting-Peng Liang,et al.  Effect of store design on consumer purchases: an empirical study of on-line bookstores , 2002, Inf. Manag..

[23]  Varun Grover,et al.  Investigating the Impact of Web Site Value and Advertising on Firm Performance in Electronic Commerce , 2002, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[24]  Peter R. Dickson,et al.  Getting Return on Quality: Revenue Expansion, Cost Reduction, or Both? , 2002 .

[25]  P. Shrout,et al.  Mediation in experimental and nonexperimental studies: new procedures and recommendations. , 2002, Psychological methods.

[26]  G. Dhillon,et al.  Measuring Factors that Influence the Success of Internet Commerce , 2002, Inf. Syst. Res..

[27]  Jonathan W. Palmer,et al.  Web Site Usability, Design, and Performance Metrics , 2002, Inf. Syst. Res..

[28]  Arnaldo Coelho,et al.  Exploratory evidence of channel performance in single vs multiple channel strategies , 2003 .

[29]  Eyal Biyalogorsky,et al.  Clicks and Mortar: The Effect of On-line Activities on Off-line Sales , 2003 .

[30]  Xueming Luo,et al.  Contextual Marketing and Customer-Orientation Strategy for E-Commerce: An Empirical Analysis , 2003, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[31]  G. Chakraborty,et al.  What Do Customers Consider Important in B2B Websites? , 2003, Journal of Advertising Research.

[32]  Thompson S. H. Teo,et al.  A model for Web adoption , 2004, Inf. Manag..

[33]  Gregory S. Carpenter,et al.  Measuring Marketing Productivity: Current Knowledge and Future Directions , 2004 .

[34]  Rajiv Kohli,et al.  Introduction to the Special Issue: Measuring the Business Value of Information Technology in e-Business Environments , 2004, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[35]  Rajdeep Grewal,et al.  Strategic Responses to New Technologies and Their Impact on Firm Performance , 2004, Journal of Marketing.

[36]  Ephraim R. McLean,et al.  Measuring e-Commerce Success: Applying the DeLone & McLean Information Systems Success Model , 2004, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[37]  Amitava Dutta,et al.  A Process-Oriented Framework for Justifying Information Technology Projects in e-Business Environments , 2004, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[38]  D. Wittink,et al.  Customer satisfaction and retail sales performance: an empirical investigation , 2004 .

[39]  Michel Tenenhaus,et al.  PLS path modeling , 2005, Comput. Stat. Data Anal..

[40]  Varun Grover,et al.  The Relationship of E-Commerce Competence to Customer Value and Firm Performance: An Empirical Investigation , 2005, J. Manag. Inf. Syst..

[41]  Ahmet H. Kirca,et al.  Market Orientation: A Meta-Analytic Review and Assessment of its Antecedents and Impact on Performance , 2005 .

[42]  Saggi Nevo,et al.  Development and Validation of a Perceptual Instrument to Measure E-Commerce Performance , 2005, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[43]  P. Auger.  The Impact of Interactivity and Design Sophistication on the Performance of Commercial Websites for Small Businesses , 2005 .

[44]  Kenneth L. Kraemer,et al.  Determinants of E-Business Use in U.S. Firms , 2006, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[45]  Varun Grover,et al.  An empirical study on Web-based services and customer loyalty , 2006, Eur. J. Inf. Syst..

[46]  Richard T. Vidgen,et al.  Data triangulation and web quality metrics: A case study in e-government , 2006, Inf. Manag..

[47]  Jean Talbot,et al.  B2C web site quality and emotions during online shopping episodes: An empirical study , 2006, Inf. Manag..

[48]  Steve Muylle,et al.  The role of pleasure in web site success , 2006, Inf. Manag..

[49]  Andrew B. Whinston,et al.  Strategic Investment in Switching Cost: An Integrated Customer Acquisition and Retention Perspective , 2006, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[50]  Ingoo Han,et al.  The impact of Web quality and playfulness on user acceptance of online retailing , 2007, Inf. Manag..

[51]  S. Neslin,et al.  Multichannel customer management: Understanding the research-shopper phenomenon , 2007 .

[52]  Narayan Ramasubbu,et al.  Designing Web Sites for Customer Loyalty Across Business Domains: A Multilevel Analysis , 2006, J. Manag. Inf. Syst..

[53]  Richard T. Watson,et al.  WebQual: An Instrument for Consumer Evaluation of Web Sites , 2007, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[54]  Francisco Muñoz-Leiva,et al.  Web Acceptance Model (WAM): Moderating effects of user experience , 2007, Inf. Manag..

[55]  Waiman Cheung,et al.  Evolution of e-commerce Web sites: A conceptual framework and a longitudinal study , 2007, Inf. Manag..

[56]  Blanca Hernández Ortega,et al.  International Journal of Information Management , 2022 .

[57]  Carlos Flavián Blanco,et al.  Effects of visual and textual information in online product presentations: looking for the best combination in website design , 2010, Eur. J. Inf. Syst..

[58]  Ahmet H. Kirca,et al.  Firm Innovativeness and Its Performance Outcomes: A Meta-Analytic Review and Theoretical Integration , 2012 .

[59]  L. A. Hayes,et al.  How Do Technology Readiness, Platform Functionality and Trust Influence C2c User Satisfaction? , 2012 .

[60]  N. Venkatraman,et al.  On the Measurement of Business Performance in Strategy Research: A Comparison of Approaches , 2015 .

[61]  Shuiwang Ji,et al.  Partial Least Squares , 2016 .