A framework and methodology for evaluating e‐commerce Web sites

Abstract

The corporate Web site is an indispensable part of any e‐commerce venture. If users find it difficult to do electronic transactions, they will visit another online source, or go to a physical source instead. Evaluating the performance of e‐commerce Web sites has received some attention in the past few years, but there is still a pressing need for a more comprehensive approach. This paper attempts to address this need by providing an e‐commerce Web site evaluation framework and method built on solid business principles, and using multidimensional scaling to analyse evaluation data and present the results in a graphic manner for easy interpretation.

A strategic framework for website evaluation based on a review of the literature from 1995–2006

“…Combined-approach studies Szymanski and Hise [85] 139 Survey Liu and Arnett [53] 125 Survey Palmer [64] 116 Survey Devaraj et al [22] 92 Survey Srinivasan et al [83] 78 Survey Wolfinbarger and Gilly [93] 71 Survey Barnes and Vidgen [5] 39 Survey Harris and Goode [34] 37 Survey Evans et al [28] 28 Case study Roy et al [76] 23 Experiment Okazaki and Rivas [62] 19 Content analysis Li et al [48] 17 Survey Cao et al [18] 16 Experiment Wan [91] 16 Content analysis van der Merwe et al [88] 15 Concept development. Barnes and Vidgen [6] 15…”

“…Case study Kim and Stoel [42] 12 Survey Marsico and Levialdi [56] 12 Experiment Kuo [45] 12 Survey Gonzá lez and Palacios [30] 11 Content analysis Bhatt [12] 8 Experiment Chakraborty et al [15] 8 Survey Evanschitzky et al [29] 8 Survey Kim et al [43] 7 Survey Shchiglik and Barnes [78] 7 Survey Supphellen and Nysveen [85] 7 Survey Van Iwaarden et al [88] 7 Survey Wulf et al [95] 5 Survey Cheung and Huang [16] 5 Content analysis Baloglu and Pekcan [4] 5 Content analysis Singh and Matsuo [80] 4 Content analysis Blake et al [13] 3 Survey Song and Zahedi [82] 2 Experiment Petre et al [68] 2 Experiment Zviran et al [100] 2 Survey Ellinger et al [26] 2 Content analysis Singh and Baack [80] 1 Content analysis Barnes and Vidgen [7] 1 Case study Ethier et al [27] 1 Experiment available and to determine their appropriate framework. Table 3 presents the IS, marketing, and combined-approach studies included in our review.…”

Evaluating e-learning web site quality in a fuzzy environment

“…Statistical methods are the most widely used assessment tools. 15,17,24,[28][29][30] Additionally, other methods such as multidimensional scaling and correspondence analysis, 31 weighted scores, 32 simulation, 33 the index method, 34 and soft computing technologies 35 are also used in assessing and improving Web site quality. To identify the important dimensions influencing the e-learners' assessment of e-learning Web sites, three-stage research is conducted: an in-depth analysis of the related literature, a survey among e-learners, and the collection/ combination of sector experts' experiences.…”

Evaluating customer aid functions of online stores with agent-based models of customer behavior and evolution strategy

“…[9,50]. Second, while it is usually difficult to quantify many general measures of design principles or web-site evaluation frameworks for the automated evaluation of customer aid functions [11,20,54], this approach enables the simulated analysis of customer aid functions using direct measures of effectiveness and efficiency.…”