Justification for the Model

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The Internet was originally conceived as mode of communication that would be robust in the event of an attack or sabotage (Schneider and Perry, 2001). Its development into the Web and its later conversion to a graphical medium in the mid -1990s extended its capabilities. It captured the public's imagination and with the availability of domestic modems and cable access, what was once the province of academic and military text-based communication transformed into a rich, if anarchic, information medium with public access. Its potential as a consumer information and sales medium led to the appearance of innovative on-line commercial ventures, many of which had synergies with the Web medium itself. The Internet was a phenomenon that truly sneaked up on an unsuspecting world (Schneider and Perry, 2001). During the early stages of commercial colonization of the Web, widely disparate estimates of the growth of Internet commerce were evident. In hindsight, many overly optimistic predictions were made for the growth of on-line sales (Claymon, 1998; Colarusso, 2000). While estimates of the current level of "e-commerce activity" are obtainable, the underlying definitions of "e-commerce" vary (Congressional Research Service, 2002; U.S. Census Bureau, 2000). Some statistics include transactions using older Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) technologies, while others do not differentiate between B2B and B2C sales. In addition, methodological differences also exist in the derivation of estimates. However, there is a consensus that B2C e-commerce is growing at a rate far below that originally predicted. In the USA retail e-commerce sales still account for less than 1.5% of total sales (U.S. Census Bureau, 2002) and the press is replete with articles, either searching for, or expounding reasons for this situation, for example, Claymon (1998), Colarusso, (2000) and Starling (2001). Despite its slow start, it is likely that B2C e-tailing will be a permanent feature of the consumer environment. The only uncertainties appear to be the duration of the adoption period and the extent to which marketing via the new media will eventually replace or augment consumer in-store purchasing.

The slower than expected growth in B2C Web purchases suggests that human factors may be an issue. As an example, estimates of the percentage of shopping carts abandoned range from more than 42% (1998 figures cited in Hurst and Gellady, 2000) to 75% (Gordon, 2000). Gordon (2000) also suggests that some 27% of transactions are abandoned at the payment screen losing US$6 billion in potential sales. Porter (2001) attributes the slower than predicted growth in on-line consumer sales to a dissipation of the previous consumer curiosity caused by media hype. The diffusion of innovation literature (e.g., Rogers, 1995) suggests that e-commerce will only be adopted if it offers a relative advantage, trialability and minimal complexity. These issues and the marketing concept imply that the commercial B2C success of the Web will only occur if on-line content meets the information and transaction needs of consumers. In the rush to 'set up shop' on the Web, very few firms identified the needs and wants of Web consumers (Hoffman and Novak, 1996a). Consequently Web page designers experimented with information formats in an empirical vacuum. Having re-established the importance of fulfilling consumer needs, it is appropriate to consider the information search task facing Web consumers.

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