Title

Electronic Window Dressing: Impression Management With Websites

Keywords

Impression management; Organizational image; Websites

Abstract

Businesses have embraced the Internet to reap economic advantages through the use of Websites. Most Website design guidelines fail to address issues of branding and identity formation, focusing instead on concerns adapted from previous technologies. However, many firms are not getting their desired results from the Website investments they have made following design guidelines reflecting graphic layout and system usability issues. We suggest that Websites should be considered 'electronic storefronts' or public work areas providing frames of symbolic representations that create impressions of their sponsoring firms. Our exploratory study shows that Websites influence potential customers' impressions of firms' legitimacy, innovation and caring, and that these impressions vary significantly across firms and industries. Website visitors encounter symbols that are compared to mental models stored in memory and used to form impressions of the site and to draw inferences about the firm. These inferences have previously been found to influence purchasing behavior. Designers should be cognizant of these aspects of eBusiness and executives should recognize the power of Web-based impression management. Identity management must take center stage in creating a Web presence. © 2003 Palgrave Macmillan Ltd.

Publication Date

1-1-2003

Publication Title

European Journal of Information Systems

Volume

12

Issue

4

Number of Pages

309-322

Document Type

Article

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.ejis.3000470

Socpus ID

1442303735 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/1442303735

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