Looking for the Definition of Website Quality

Abstract

Despite the numerous studies devoted to the analysis of the relationship between website quality and user reactiveness, a uniform definition of website quality is missing. Research focusing on website quality generally combines multiple dimensions and scientific theories to tackle the complexity of a website (Chen et al. in Int J Inf Manage 37(1):1563–1574, 2017; Loiacono et al. in Mark Theory Appl 13(3):432–438, 2002; Wells et al., 2011). The most frequently used approaches include traditional concepts such as the theory of reasoned action (Fishbein and Ajzen in J Exp Soc Psychol 12(6):579–584, 1976; Understanding attitudes and predicting social behavior, 1980) and the technology acceptance model (Davis in MIS Q 13(3):319, 1989). Even if these two concepts are not used directly, some researchers describe them as the stepping stone for their own innovative quality assessment methods (Bai et al. in Int J Hospitality Manage 27(3):391–402, 2008; Luo et al. in 2016 13th international conference on service systems and service management (ICSSSM), 2016; Pandey and Chawla in Qual Mark Res Int J 19(3):339–356, 2016). In addition to these traditional concepts, website quality is also evaluated with the same metrics as information systems and interactive interfaces (Abou-Shouk and Khalifa in J Travel Tourism Mark 34(5):608–623, 2016; Trivedi and Trivedi in Int J Electron Bus 14(4):309, 2018). In the following paragraphs, we review and classify the attributes associated with website quality both in the scientific literature and in international standards. The main objective of this chapter is to create a solid basis for the future testing and quantification of these attributes using standardized metrics and tools.