Evaluating the World Wide Web: A Global Study of Commercial Sites

A framework to evaluate Web sites from a customer's perspective of value-added is proposed and a global study covering 1,800 sites is conducted to give a profile of commercial use of the World Wide Web in 1996.

Abstract

While commercial applications of the Internet proliferate, particularly in the form of business sites on the World Wide Web, on-line business is still relatively insignificant. One reason is that truly compelling applications have yet to be devised to penetrate the mass market. To help identify approaches that may eventually be successful, one must address the question of what value is being created on the Web. As a first step, this paper proposes a framework to evaluate Web sites from a customer's perspective of value-added. A global study covering 1,800 sites, with representative samples from diverse industries and localities worldwide, is conducted to give a profile of commercial use of the World Wide Web in 1996.