What Web site characteristics make a successful B2C Web site? Heaps of product information? Slick graphics? Security? Or safeguarding consumer privacy? While there have been numerous suggestions and guidelines for creating effective Web sites, only few businesses have been successful in turning browsers into buyers. These companies have mastered the art of effective Web site, using it as a key value proposition to lure, attract and convince consumers.
Although a consumer’s entire experience with a company influences the likelihood of a purchase, the Web site characteristics play a vital role as they form the primary interface of consumer interactions and communications. Based on the two studies we conducted, several lessons emerge for retailers considering online selling.
The consumer survey revealed four broad dimensions underlying B2C sites and their relative importance. Each of these dimensions is important, and neglecting even one of these dimensions could prove detrimental to the online business of merchants. Online consumers seem to expect rich, up-to-date and complete information on products, services and the merchant, and they want it in an easy-to-use and navigable interface. These findings are consistent with Madeja and Schoder (2003). They found that in order to attract and retain surfers, merchants should focus on frequently updating the Web site content, providing rich content, and ensuring that the navigation features are easy to use. Similarly, it is important to ensure that the graphics and multimedia do not mar their online surfing and buying experience. As Hoque and Lohse (1999) pointed out and as mentioned by Yeung and Lu (2004), “the long download time associated with video has often been regarded as undesirable for commercial Web sites” (p. 492). While the presence of aids to make the purchasing decision possible is welcome by consumers, they are only secondary to pertinent product and service information. Also, in order to establish the credibility of vendors, it is important to provide detailed contact information and multiple methods through which consumers could reach out and interact with the merchants.
Consumers want multiple channels of dialog with the company — both online mechanisms such as e-mail and chat, as well as off-line mechanisms such as telephone conversations. The advantage of having multiple modes of communication is that this gives the merchant added credibility that most pure-play, fly-by-night Internet companies often lack.
Though consumers are increasingly using the Internet for online purchasing, their confidence in online shopping is likely to be shattered if their sensitive personal and financial information is not closely guarded. Consumer trust has become a key element in building confidence in the Web site and needs to be placed at the heart of a firm’s Internet strategy. However, several retailers do not seem to have realized the importance of building online consumer trust. As Urban et al. (2000, p. 40) note:
“Most sites on the Internet today do not focus on building trust as a part of an ongoing relationship with their customers. Many Web sites act merely as self-service catalogs: if you know what you’re looking for, you can find and order the product or service. Such sites are commonly characterized by their crowded format, flashing banner-ads, and off-price promotions. Pursuing the hard sell, these sites do not give customers much information or help in making buying decisions. Not, surprisingly they convert few of their visitors into purchasers, suffer low customer retention, and generate meager profits. Many companies have failed with such an approach to marketing on the Internet, primarily because they have failed to build trust.”
Apart from providing good content on a Web site, and presenting it using an effective design, customer trust can be won only by providing consumers with a secure, and private shopping experience. Therefore, security and privacy become key elements in building B2C Web sites. In fact, our research pointed to security being the topmost concern in the minds of consumers, and its importance in determining the likelihood of consumer purchase. While the consumer survey revealed security to be the dominant dimension affecting the online purchase intention of consumers, our analysis of best selling Web sites, reiterated and revalidated our findings from the survey. Security emerged as the most critical construct, affecting the purchase intentions as well as online sales.
Many options are available for implementing secure payment mechanisms and for conducting secure online transactions on the Web. While most online retailers use commonly available security protocols, what differentiates an effective online retailer from ineffective ones is the extent to which the site is able to alleviate the fears in the minds of consumers, and build consumer trust. Online consumers engaging in shopping need to feel confident that their information and transactions are secure. For achieving this, merely implementing some security mechanisms may not be sufficient. An online merchant needs to use multiple mechanisms and cues for convincing the consumers that their information would be safe. Our studies revealed that consumers might feel more comfortable to conduct online transactions in environments where they are provided with multiple modes of making payments, and in those sites that give them additional security with password protected log-on mechanisms.
Online retailers should also take measures to ensure that the information provided by consumers will be kept confidential and will not be shared with or provided to other third parties. One of the interesting challenges for any business trying to engage in online commerce relates to collection and analysis of customer information. While the Web paves an easy way to gather a wealth of information about consumers, potential misuse of this information could turn off the customers. Many online consumers may be hesitant to transact with a site that they feel could infringe upon their privacy. Online merchants should have a clear policy on how they would handle and secure the information gathered about the consumers. More importantly, businesses should also take adequate steps to make its customers aware of the privacy policies. Explicit privacy statements that explain why and how the information collected would be used will go a long way in enhancing the consumer trust. Since many online consumers are little aware of the privacy seals such as TRUSTe, clear privacy policies and strict adherence to them becomes key in winning customer confidence. Our survey results confirmed privacy to be a very important dimension that needed to be considered in building Web sites, and our analysis of best practices of online retailers pointed out to the importance of privacy policies over the third-party privacy seals.
While there is proliferation of firms that seek to sell their products and services online, there are several important challenges remain in creating, designing and managing their Web sites. If online merchants will have to attract and retain their consumers, and realize a good return on their investments, they will have to have build Web sites that are informative, well-designed and trust-generating. Our research studies have shown content, design, security and privacy to be the four cornerstones of an effective B2C Web site design. Companies that want to be successful in their e-business efforts must focus on these four critical dimensions in order to attract and retain their consumers. This will be key to their survival and success in future.