A Framework for Quality Assurance of Electronic Commerce Websites

In the last decade, electronic commerce has significantly contributed to national economic growth. This is evident in that “according to Forrester Research, the United States (US) online retail reached $175 billion in 2007 and is projected to grow to $335 billion by 2012”. (Source: http://www.sescommerce.com/ecommerce-growth.asp; accessed 9 May 2009) And yet, although the electronic commerce market value is growing fast, there are many electronic commerce Websites that are failing and disappearing from the market (Pather et al., 2003). The success of online business will for the large part depend on the quality of electronic commerce Websites. In keeping up with the expectations of online consumers, electronic commerce retailers will continue to face to the challenges of ensuring the quality of electronic commerce Websites. Although there have been intense discussions about quality in the literature, quality dimensions of electronic commerce are not well established and recent studies indicate that more research is needed (Mohanty et al. 2007). Lohse and Spiller (1998) stated that “the nature of electronic commerce is diverse”. Due to this nature, the quality of electronic commerce Websites can be viewed from several perspectives i.e. product quality, systems as product, service quality of provider, software product quality, system design, quality of the human-computer interaction (HCI) etc. (Balfagih et al, 2008). Further in analyzing the complexity of electronic commerce quality, one can apply various bodies of knowledge i.e. information systems, marketing, human-computer interaction and design (Balfagih et al, 2008). Hence, the evaluation of quality of electronic commerce Websites depends on the perspective and role of the assessor. The assessor may be an online shopper, repeat purchaser, potential consumer, electronic commerce business owner, service provider to the business owner, Web developer etc. This chapter proposes a framework that synthesizes previous multiple perspectives. Its aim is to aid research and practice in assuring quality of electronic commerce Websites. In this section, we have presented an overview the research background. In the following section, we discuss our review of literature on models for quality of electronic commerce Websites. Subsequently, we discuss the critiques of the literature and present the gaps that emerge out of our analysis of the literature. The gaps will be the basis for our recommendation on a framework to aid research and practice in assuring quality of electronic commerce Websites. Following that, we present the concept of software quality and software quality assurance. 9