Modelling Website Stickiness at Initial Encounters

Background

Website stickiness has been described as repetitive visits to and use of a preferred website because of a deeply held commitment to reuse the website consistently in the future, despite situational influences and marketing efforts that have the potential to cause switching behaviour (Li, Browne, & Wetherbe, 2006). It is a user’s willingness to return to and prolong his/her duration and depth of stay on the website (Lin, 2007). There are also research scholars who have contended that stickiness consists of mechanisms on the website that encourage consumers to stay as well as visit the website regularly (DeFigueiredo, 2000; Dubelaar, Leong, & Alpert, 2003; Koo, Nam, Lee, & Lee, 2003). Gillespie, Malay, Oliver, Olsen and Thiel (1999) defined website stickiness as the positive characteristics portrayed by the website that strive to maximise the duration, frequency and pleasant experience of the web surfer. Suffice to say, stickiness involves the ability of websites to draw and retain customers (Zott, Amit, & Donlevy, 2000; Wang, 2010a).