The In-credible Web
by Sam Vaknin

Research shows that 75% of all respondents resort to the Internet as a
primary information provider. The inundation of irrelevant material
caused most surfers to confine their surfing to 10 Web sites which they
deem reliable, timely, accurate, objective, authoritative, and credible.
The rest of the Internet gets the leftovers. This worrying trend can be
reversed only through the emergence of independent and
commercially-viable rating agencies. Web sites (at least the business
ones) should be willing to pay for credible rating to enhance their
stickiness and attract monetizable "eyeballs". In the absence of such
third party accreditation, the Internet risks both irrelevance and
disrepute.


http://www.webcredibility.org/

People are conditioned to trust written words, not to mention images. "I
read it in the paper" or "As seen on TV" are worn out but still
effective clichés. The Internet combines both the written and the seen.
It is both a textual and a visual (and audio) medium. Do people trust
Internet content? Is the incredible Internet - credible?

In the "brick and mortar" world, credibility is associated with brands.
A brand, in effect, guarantees the quality and specifications of a
product (think McDonald's hamburgers), its performance (think Palm),
level of service and commitment to customer care (Amazon), variety, or
price (Wal-Mart). Brands are sustained and enhanced by advertising
campaigns. The content or sales pitch of specific ads are often less
important than the message conveyed by the very existence of a campaign:
"This company is rich enough (read: stable, reliable, trustworthy, here
to stay) to spend millions on advertising".

The Internet has very few brands (Yahoo!, Amazon) - and some of them are
tarnished. Some "old media" brands have entered the fray (Barnes and
Noble, The Wall Street Journal, the Britannica) - hitherto without much
success. The overwhelming bulk of Web content is created or disseminated
by small time entrepreneurs and monomaniacs.

So, how does one establish or acquire credibility in such a diffuse and
anarchic medium?

Enter Stanford University's "Web Credibility Project".

They define themselves thus:

"Our goal is to understand what leads people to believe what they find
on the Web. We hope this knowledge will enhance Web site design and
promote future research on Web credibility. As part of this ongoing
project we are:

Performing quantitative research on Web credibility.

Collecting all public information on Web credibility.

Acting as a clearinghouse for this information.

Facilitating research and discussion about Web credibility.

Helping designers create credible Web sites."

Examples of current projects:

Timeliness: How does having out-of-date content affect the credibility
of a Web site?

Interaction: How does having a personalized interaction with a Web site
affect its credibility?

Negative Content: How does displaying negative content associated with a
branded web site affect the credibility of the brand?

It is useful to confine ourselves to this definition of trust:

"The subjective belief, perception, or conviction that information
provided is true, factual, and objective, and that commitments
undertaken, explicitly, or implicitly, will be honored fully and in a
timely manner".

Such perception, belief, or conviction are based on:

Past experience in general (with spam, with merchants, or providers,
with a similar product category, with the same type of content, etc.)
and personal proclivity to trust or to distrust

Experience with the specific merchant or provider (whether personal or
gleaned from other people's feedback - reviews, complaints, and
opinions)

There is little that a merchant can do about the former. The latter is,
expectedly, influenced by:

Professionalism (as evident in Web site design, e-commerce facilities,
user-friendliness, navigability, links to other relevant Web pages,
links from other Web sites, ease and speed of download, updated content,
proofreading, domain name which matches the company's name,
availability, multilingualism, etc.)

Trustworthiness (lack of bias, good intentions, truthfulness,
thoroughness, objectivity, expertise and author credentials,
knowledgeable sources and treatment, citations and bibliography), and
what the authors of the research call "Real World Feel" (physical
address, phone/fax numbers, non-Web e-mail address, photos of facilities
and staff, audio recording, ownership by a not for profit organization,
URL ending with ORG).

Commercial Web sites are less trusted. Cluttered ads, paid
subscriptions, e-commerce enabled forms - all reduce the site's
credibility! This is especially true if the entire site is a one, big ad
and when it is hard to distinguish ads from content.

Track record (how veteran is the merchant, past financial performance,
credit history, brand name recognition, lists of customers, etc.)

Selection (how many products are carried, how often is inventory
refreshed, etc.)

Advertising (is the company's business sufficiently lucrative to support
a campaign?)

Service (good service indicates a reassuring readiness to sacrifice the
bottom line to cater to the customer's legitimate concerns, feedback
forms, live support, etc.)

Full disclosure of rates, prices, privacy policy, security issues, etc.

Feedback from other users (opinions, reviews, comments, FAQs, support
groups, etc.)

Site rating and certification by trustworthy agencies (like the Better
Business Bureau - BBB, VeriSign, TRUSTe) - or awards won (from credible
and reputable organizations). Links from other, well-known and
believable Web sites.

The Credibility Web discovered that trust in e-commerce is also
influenced by idiosyncratic factors. Certain domain names (org) are more
trusted than others (com). Too many ads, broken links, typos, outdated
or old content - all diminish trust. In the absence of proven markers
and behavioral guidelines, people seem to resort to extrapolation ("if
they can't maintain their own Web site ...") and stereotypes (e.g.,
NGO's are more trustworthy than corporations).

As Web sites proliferate (Google indexes well over 3 billion now) and
Web authoring becomes a routine task - the noise to signal ratio of
garbage to useful information is bound to deteriorate. Search engines
already incorporate crude measures of credibility in their rankings
(e.g., the number of links from external Web sites). But, to remain
useful, search engines (and Web directories) would do well to rate Web
content more comprehensively and thoroughly. They should rank Web sites
by authoritativeness, reliability, and objectivity, for instance.

Research shows that 75% of all respondents resort to the Internet as a
primary information provider. The inundation of irrelevant material
caused most surfers to confine their surfing to 10 Web sites (akin to
shopping mall "anchors"), which they deem reliable, timely, accurate,
objective, authoritative, and credible. The rest of the Internet gets
the leftovers. This worrying trend can be reversed only through the
emergence of independent and commercially-viable rating agencies. Web
sites (at least the business ones) should be willing to pay for credible
rating to enhance their stickiness and attract monetizable "eyeballs".
In the absence of such third party accreditation, the Internet risks
both irrelevance and disrepute.


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