THE IMPORTANCE OF WEB SITE ATMOSPHERICS WITH EMPHASIS ON VISUAL COMPLEXITY IN ONLINE RETAILING BASED ON S-O-R PARADIGM

Year 2017, , 348 - 354, 30.12.2017

Nesenur Altinigne Elif Karaosmanoglu

https://doi.org/10.17261/Pressacademia.2017.767

Abstract

Purpose - Online retailing web sites have become a valuable
platform where consumers are exposed to companies’ products and services.
Online web sites’ visual characteristics include text, pictures, graphics,
layout, motion have been identified as some of the main factors contributing to
repetitive visits and purchases. As visual design and making the right design
decisions are critical to effective online retailing, clarifying these visual
elements are crucial. Accordingly, the purpose of this study is to provide the
main insights highlighted in the literature related to online shopping web site
visual cues as well as to propose the adaptation of visual complexity concept
to this relatively new environment via S-O-R paradigm discussion.

Methodology - Through a literature review, the importance of web site
atmospherics with emphasis on visual complexity and their influence on
consumers’ decision making process via their cognitive and emotional states
based on S-O-R paradigm is discussed.

Findings – Both the online and offline retailing literature survey suggests
that visual complexity of an online retailing web site may have a strong effect
on marketing outcomes (revisit/repurchase) and S-O-R paradigm is the
foundational theory that helps to support this major argument.  

Conclusion - As online shopping becomes more competitive, online
retailers continuously look for ways to attract more online customers and hence
increase their purchase intentions. One way to induce revisit intention is to
provide an online retailing environment that features superior atmospherics
that are visually less complex. Rather than getting lost in the design decision
of each element individually, taking a more holistic approach attempting to
understand the interplay between visual cues that define visual complexity is a
necessity to generate effective marketing strategies in online retailing.

Keywords

online retailing, web site atmospherics, visual complexity, online shopping, PAD model

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