Effects of information usefulness, visual attractiveness, and usability on web visitors' trust and behavioral intentions

To explore the effects of information usefulness, visual attractiveness and (actual and perceived) usability, an experiment was conducted in which 40 customers visited the website of a Dutch Internet hosting company. Half of the participants were given search tasks (condition 1), the other half were allowed to explore the website without such a task (condition 2). The participants had to think aloud in both conditions. Afterwards, they judged the website's visual attractiveness, the usefulness of its content, and its usability, as well as answered questions about their trust in the company and their behavioral intentions. The results underline the importance of an effective web presence for organizations: 27% of the variance in the participants' trust in the company was explained by the website characteristics included in this study; on top of the participants' trust in the company, the website characteristics explained another 15% of the variance in participants' intentions regarding the company. Of the website characteristics included, both usability and visual attractiveness had a significant relationship with the participants' trust in the company.