Contemporary Research in E-Marketing_2

16 Swami and Krishna Data Collection In the first survey, we collect data for classifying Web sites, and in the second survey, we collect data for measurement of involvement. In the third survey, we collect data for measure of involvement after some fixed duration of time. Initially, before the first survey, we follow judges-based procedure to select the Web sites for conducting the three surveys. Selection of Web Sites We classified Web sites in a 2´2 (Information properties ´ Entertainment properties) matrix on the basis of the level (high or low) of their information and entertainment properties. To initiate the selection of the Web sites, we use www.bestindiansites.com’s “Top 50 Web Sites” appraisal, which uses param-eters such as traffic ratings by various traffic ranking tools, cross-links with search engines/other sites, ratings on various quality parameters (e.g., load time, browser compatibility), HTML validity, content, site design, and listings in major search engines. The following steps were taken for primary selection of Web sites: Step 1: We used “Top 50 Web Sites” data by www.bestindiansites.com for six months prior to the study. We give one point if the Web site appears in the Top 50 list in a week, and zero otherwise. We then sum to get the total number of times a Web site appeared in the list during the six months.9 Step 2: Using a cutoff value of 70%, we discarded the Web sites that appeared in the list less than 70% of time.10 A reduced pool of 46 Web sites was obtained after this step. Step 3: The above short-listed Web sites were classified on the basis of information and entertainment properties of Web sites. The classification was done by three independent judges, who were postgraduate students and used the Web (for surfing, literature search, paper downloads, etc.) for the previous two years on average of over 30 hours per week. The judges were asked to check the general criteria that the Web sites are easy to understand by the 18 to 25-year-old student respondents, and the Web sites are of general interest (i.e., without any cultural or regional biases). In each quadrant of the 2´2 matrix, we retained only those Web sites for which there were no differences among judges. This resulted in a set of 20 Web Copyright © 2006, Idea Group Inc. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of Idea Group Inc. is prohibited. Evaluation of Web Sites on Information and Entertainment Properties 17 Table 1. Web sites classified by the judges on the basis of information and entertainment properties Entertainment Properties High High www.rediff.com www.123india.com www.indiainfo.com www.indiatimes.com www.indya.com www.webindia.com Low www.khel.com www.smashits.com www.indiafm.com www.nazara.com www.paheli.com Low www.mapsofindia.com www.timesofindia.com www.naukri.com www.indiainfoline.com www.allindia.com www.dgreetings.com www.theholidays.com www.indiaserver.com www.ciol.com sites as shown in Table 1. To validate the classification by the judges, we then contacted a larger group of respondents as discussed below. Survey 1: Classification of Web Sites Survey 1 is used for classifying, in terms of numerical values, the Web sites on the basis of their information and entertainment properties. This survey was conducted with a sample of 31 respondents. Each respondent examined three randomly assigned sites out of the 20 Web sites11 listed in Table 1. After discarding some incomplete forms, there were 89 responses, which were used for the classification of Web sites. The average of information and entertainment properties (on a scale of 1 to 5) of each Web site is presented in Table 2, and their relative positions are shown in Figure 2. We then compared the positions of the sites in Table 1 and Figure 2 and selected the sites, which were common to both for a particular quadrant. Therefore, we selected www.rediff.com, www.indiainfoline.com, www.allindia.com, and www.nazara.com for further analysis. We selected two additional Web sites (www.mapsofindia.com and www.indiafm.com) closer to the mean for better analysis of the differences between the sites’ evaluations. The brief overviews and screenshots of some short-listed sites are shown in Appendix 2. Copyright © 2006, Idea Group Inc. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of Idea Group Inc. is prohibited. 18 Swami and Krishna Table 2. Site scores on information and entertainment properties S. No. Name of Web Sites 1 www.rediff.com 2 www.123india.com 3 www.indiainfo.com 4 www.indiatimes.com 5 www.indya.com 6 www.webindia.com 7 www.mapsofindia.com 8 www.timesofindia.com 9 www.naukri.com 10 www.indiainfoline.com 11 www.allindia.com 12 www.dgreetings.com 13 www.theholidayspot.com 14 www.khel.com 15 www.smashits.com 16 www.indiafm.com 17 www.nazara.com 18 www.paheli.com Mean Information Average 4.37 3.92 3.88 3.90 3.72 3.67 3.92 4.18 3.71 4.13 3.38 3.87 3.47 3.96 2.86 3.62 3.44 3.37 3.75 Entertainment Average 3.65 3.65 3.33 3.90 3.65 2.88 3.28 3.60 2.88 3.13 2.69 3.70 3.88 3.40 3.02 3.65 3.84 3.73 3.43 Figure 2. Relative positions of Web sites on the basis of information and entertainment scores Scores 4.00 Nazar 3.80 Redifff 3.60 Indiafm 3.40 Meann Mapsofindia 3.20 Indianinfoline 3.00 2.80 AAllindia 2.60 2.80 3.00 3.20 3.40 3.60 3.80 4.00 4.20 4.40 4.60 Information Copyright © 2006, Idea Group Inc. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of Idea Group Inc. is prohibited. Evaluation of Web Sites on Information and Entertainment Properties 19 Survey 2: Measurement of Involvement Survey 2 is used for measuring the involvement and positive affect of the respondents toward a Web site. This survey was conducted on a sample of 37 respondents. The sample included all the respondents who had participated in Survey 1 and six additional respondents. Most respondents (33 out of 37) in the sample were assigned two Web sites to examine, while a few (4 out of 37) were assigned four Web sites. Thus, this survey resulted in 82 responses. The sites were assigned randomly to respondents. This survey was conducted in the following manner. First, an in-class survey was conducted which was concerned with the individual characteristics pertaining to information (e.g., information-seeking tendency) and entertainment (e.g., sensation-seeking tendency) profiles of the respon-dents. Then the respondents were told the names of the Web sites randomly assigned to them 1 week before filling out the questionnaires related to utilitarian and hedonic evaluations of involvement and positive affect. They were in-structed to visit the assigned sites as many times as they could over that period. One week later, they were asked to fill out the questionnaires in the computer systems laboratory. Survey 3: Effect of Time on Involvement In Survey 3, we investigate the effect of time on the involvement of Web users at a one-week interval for three weeks. We appointed a panel of 14 respondents for this study. Half of the respondents were new respondents, while the rest had participated in the earlier two surveys. Based on the possible levels of an individual’s profiles (high ´ low, information ´ entertainment), which he/she filled in the first session, we analyzed four types of respondents in this study. For the entire period of this analysis, the respondents were assigned a specific Web site out of the four possible Web sites classified in the above fashion. Results and Analysis We performed statistical analyses using STATISTICA software on the col-lected data from various surveys. Copyright © 2006, Idea Group Inc. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of Idea Group Inc. is prohibited. 20 Swami and Krishna Reliability of the Constructs The following Cronbach alpha values were found for the various constructs: Scale Information-seeking tendency Individual specific focused attention Sensation-seeking tendency Mood variability Site information profile Site entertainment profile Utilitarian evaluation of involvement Need Value Hedonic evaluation of involvement Interest Appeal Positive affect Cronbach alpha 0.62 0.64 0.55 0.68 0.79 0.70 0.88 0.90 0.83 0.81 0.77 With the exception of sensation-seeking tendency scale, the other scales show reasonable values of Cronbach’s alpha. In case of sensation-seeking tendency scale, it is possible that some respondents were not able to relate well with some scale items such as “I sometimes like to do things that are a little frightening” or “I would not like to be hypnotized.” This could be attributed to the language or cultural barriers hindering the correct interpretation of terms “hypnotized” or “frightening.” Analyses and Interpretation of Results Results Related to Main Effects Overall Results For hypotheses testing, we use multiple regression technique. The results of individual specific main effects are shown in Table 3(A) and the results of moderator effects are shown in Table 3(B). All hypotheses, except Hypothesis 2(A), were supported at 95% level. Hypothesis 2(A) on the relationship between Copyright © 2006, Idea Group Inc. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of Idea Group Inc. is prohibited. ... - tailieumienphi.vn