Interactivity and Credibility of Website on Website Usage Intention

Abstract

With the emergence of new information and communication technology, the presence of concept of interactivity in the field of marketing empirical investigations has dramatically increased. To expand the knowledge of the domain of interactivity, this study was conducted to examine the influence of perceived website interactivity on website usage intentions, and the mediation effect of perceived website credibility on the relationship between interactivity and intention. For this empirical research study, the framework was mainly drawn from TAM and MAIN models, which are related to technology acceptance and adaptation. Moreover, this study aims at enhancing customers’ intention to use the hotel’s official websites through interactive features rather than the involvement of a third party. The study was conducted by collecting data through close-ended questionnaires from 200 international visitors to Sri Lanka, who also have visited a Sri Lankan Hotel’s official website at least once. The results indicate that the more the viewers of the website perceive that the website is interactive, the more the viewers perceived that the website is credible, which in turn leads to several behavioral intentions. Also, this study highlights the importance of each of the three major dimensions of interactivity (active control/user control, two-way communication/reciprocal communication and responsiveness/synchronicity) in the hotel sector. Its general conclusion, theoretical contribution, societal implication, managerial contribution and implications for future research were discussed at the end.