In the emerging electronic environment, knowing how to create customercentered Web sites is of great importance. This paper reports two studies on user perceptions of Web sites. First, Kano's model ...of quality was used in an exploratory investigation of customer quality expectations for a specific type of site (CNN.com). The quality model was then extended by treating broader site types/domains. The results showed that (1) customers' quality expectations change over time, and thus no single quality checklist will be good for very long, (2) the Kano model can be used as a framework or method for identifying quality expectations and the time transition of quality factors, (3) customers in a Web domain do not regard all quality factors as equally important, and (4) the rankings of important quality factors differ from one Web domain to another, but certain factors were regarded as highly important across all the domains studied.
The internet has become a commonly used information source for people seeking to understand their health care options. However, inconsistent representation about what stem cell treatments are ...available and from whom, coupled with the lack of transparency about what has been shown to work or is even safe, can distract and mislead users. Given these challenges, there is a need to develop effective evidence-based tools for delivering information about health care options involving stem cells.
A need to redesign an existing website in Australia was identified to provide trustworthy information about stem cell research and to counter misinformation. Using a participatory design approach to generate an understanding of what information users need for stem cell treatments, the Stem Cells Australia website serves as a case study for the development and evaluation of websites delivering complex messages about science and health.
This study comprised 3 steps. First, a focus group and several one-on-one interviews with a purposive sample of users (n=12) were conducted to identify their needs and requirements. Second, we designed a new version of the website based on findings from the focus group and interviews. Finally, for evaluating the participatory design process, we collected 180 days of Google Analytics data for both the original and redesigned versions (90 days for each) and compared their differences using 2-sample z tests.
The feedback from participants was grouped into 3 themes-needed and unwanted information, how and where to obtain information, and their information preferences. These were translated into requirements for rebuilding the website. The redesigned version reached users in other continents, despite the daily numbers of users (-61.2%; P<.001) and sessions (-61.7%; P<.001) decreasing. The redesigned version also showed substantial decrease in daily bounce rate (-97.2%; P<.001), significant increase in the daily average of page reads per session (+110.8%; P<.001), and long daily average for session duration (+22.9%; P=.045). Navigation flow analysis showed more traffic toward web pages related to health conditions in the redesigned version.
Websites about stem cell research need to provide content for vulnerable global audiences. Participatory design that addresses knowledge gaps and information needs can produce better performance and engagement, which can be evaluated using Google Analytics, a common web analytics tool used by many websites. Learnings for improving the metrics regarding website identity, research updates, and clinical trials are concluded, which can inform the future design of websites seeking to engage users and provide reliable and accessible science and health information including but not limited to stem cell research and therapies.
Virtual advisors often increase sales for those customers who find such online advice to be convenient and helpful. However, other customers take a more active role in their purchase decisions and ...prefer more detailed data. In general, we expect that websites are more preferred and increase sales if their characteristics (e.g., more detailed data) match customers' cognitive styles (e.g., more analytic). "Morphing" involves automatically matching the basic "look and feel" of a website, not just the content, to cognitive styles. We infer cognitive styles from clickstream data with Bayesian updating. We then balance exploration (learning how morphing affects purchase probabilities) with exploitation (maximizing short-term sales) by solving a dynamic program (partially observable Markov decision process). The solution is made feasible in real time with expected Gittins indices. We apply the Bayesian updating and dynamic programming to an experimental BT Group (formerly British Telecom) website using data from 835 priming respondents. If we had perfect information on cognitive styles, the optimal "morph" assignments would increase purchase intentions by 21%. When cognitive styles are partially observable, dynamic programming does almost as well—purchase intentions can increase by almost 20%. If implemented system-wide, such increases represent approximately $80 million in additional revenue.
In recent years, the web phishing attack has become one of the most serious web security problems, in which the phishers can steal significant financial information about the internet users to carry ...out financial thefts. Several blacklist-based conventional phishing website detection methods are used to predict the phishing websites. However, numerous phishing websites are not predicted precisely by these blacklist-based conventional methods since many new phishing websites are constantly developed and launched on the Web over time. In this study, hybrid intelligent phishing website prediction using deep neural networks (DNNs) with evolutionary algorithm-based feature selection and weighting methods are suggested to enhance the phishing website prediction. In the proposed hybrid intelligent phishing website prediction approaches, the most influential features and the optimal weights of website features are heuristically identified with the genetic algorithm (GA) to help in increasing the accuracy of phishing website prediction. Accordingly, the website features selected and weighted by the GA are utilised to train DNNs to accurately predict the phishing websites. The experimental results demonstrated that the proposed hybrid intelligent phishing website prediction approaches achieved significantly higher classification accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, and geometric mean in phishing website prediction compared to those proposed in other studies.
Web designers and providers are keenly interested in determining the ideal range of Web site complexity to facilitate user–Web site interactions. Previous empirical findings have sparked a lively ...debate about whether Web site complexity inhibits or enhances user responses toward the Web site. This paper develops a theoretical framework that posits that complexity effects shift along a sequence of evaluation criteria depending on the overall intensity and type of Web site complexity. The first experimental study confirms the suggested interaction effect of the overall degree of complexity and the sequence of evaluation criteria: the optimum is lower for upstream criteria (e.g., ease of navigation) and higher for downstream criteria (e.g., attitude toward the Web site). The second experiment distinguishes two dimensions of complexity (structural vs. visual) that evoke the antipodal effects underlying the shift in the optimal range of complexity. The paper also outlines avenues for further research and implications for marketing practitioners.
•We disentangle the contradictory findings of previous research on Web site complexity.•Study 1 shows how Web site complexity and the evaluation criteria interact.•The curvilinear effect shifts along the sequence of evaluation criteria.•Study 2 scrutinizes the antipodal effects of structural and visual complexity.•Marketers should care about the ideal level and the type of web site complexity.
Creating effective online customer experiences through well-designed product web pages is critical to success in online retailing. How such web pages should look specifically, however, remains ...unclear. Previous work has only addressed a few online design elements in isolation, without accounting for the potential need to adjust experiences to reflect the characteristics of the products or brands being sold. Across 16 experiments, this research investigates how 13 unique design elements shape four dimensions of the online customer experience (informativeness, entertainment, social presence, and sensory appeal) and thus influence purchase. Product (search vs. experience) and brand (trustworthiness) characteristics exacerbate or mitigate the uncertainty inherent in online shopping, such that they moderate the influence of each experience dimension on purchases. A field experiment that manipulates real product pages on Amazon.com affirms these findings. The results thus provide managers with clear strategic guidance on how to build effective web pages.
E-health applications are becoming integral components of general medical care delivery models and emerging for mental health care. Few exist for treatment of those with severe mental illness (SMI). ...In part, this is due to a lack of models to design such technologies for persons with cognitive impairments and lower technology experience. This study evaluated the effectiveness of an e-health design model for persons with SMI termed the Flat Explicit Design Model (FEDM).
Persons with schizophrenia (n = 38) performed tasks to evaluate the effectiveness of 5 Web site designs: 4 were prominent public Web sites, and 1 was designed according to the FEDM. Linear mixed-effects regression models were used to examine differences in usability between the Web sites. Omnibus tests of between-site differences were conducted, followed by post hoc pairwise comparisons of means to examine specific Web site differences when omnibus tests reached statistical significance.
The Web site designed using the FEDM required less time to find information, had a higher success rate, and was rated easier to use and less frustrating than the other Web sites. The home page design of one of the other Web sites provided the best indication to users about a Web site's contents. The results are consistent with and were used to expand the FEDM.
The FEDM provides evidence-based guidelines to design e-health applications for person with SMI, including: minimize an application's layers or hierarchy, use explicit text, employ navigational memory aids, group hyperlinks in 1 area, and minimize the number of disparate subjects an application addresses.
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