Capturing the Mature Traveler: Assessing Web First Impressions

This paper proposes a method of assessing hotel web sites in a way that may allow prediction of first impressions of those web sites. A model is presented that combines the ideas of media frames as defined by Matthes and Kohring and work on first impressions by Kim and Fesenmaier. To obtain information regarding the utility of this model a small sample of older travelers' first impressions was gathered and a number of web pages analyzed for frame content. The trial run with this sample showed that it is possible to obtain both cohesive results from potential searchers and to classify frames consistently between researchers. In the small sample it was found that older people (50+) with travel aspirations did make quick judgments in terms of "first impression" and were favorably impressed by pages that "inspired" users and appeared easy to understand and navigate. There was considerable difference between first impressions of the same page, but subjects reported similar reactions to pages with the same frame elements. Keywords: web page evaluation, models of e-commerce, media frames, first impressions