Conceptual Framework for Benchmarking Web Storefronts of Internet Retailers

The Web storefront of Internet retailers is the equivalent of a physical storefront of a brickand-mortar company. It is the Web surfer’s first contact with Internet retailers. While much has written about how to develop a good Website, little research has been carried out on the assessment of the effectiveness of Web storefronts. A Web storefront needs to possess not only a pleasing layout and easy navigation, but it also has to include product information, payment system, customer focus, marketing focus, security system and storefront policies. This paper proposes a conceptual framework to benchmark the Web storefronts of Internet retailers. The framework is derived from Herzberg’s motivation-hygiene theory, and expanded to assess the effectiveness of Web storefront. The contribution of this research is that Internet retailers would be able to identify specific Website features based on the proposed framework and assist the Internet retailers in improving their Web storefront.