The content and design of web sites: An empirical study.

Abstract To support the emergence of a solid knowledge base for analyzing Web activity, we have developed a framework to analyze and categorize the capabilities of Web sites. This distinguishes content from design. Content refers to the information, features, or services that are offered in the Web site, design to the way the content is made available for Web visitors. Both concepts have been operationalized by means of objective and subjective measures to capture features as well as perceptions. This framework has been applied to study how different groups of companies are using the Web for commercial purposes. We have compared Web sites based on their source, industry, and size. On average, larger Web sites seem to be`richer' and more advanced.

Applied statistics with SPSS

Accessibly written and easy to use, Applied Statistics Using SPSS is an all-in-one self-study guide to SPSS and do-it-yourself guide to statistics. What is unique about Eelko Huizingh′s approach is that this book is based around the needs of undergraduate students embarking on their own research project, and its self-help style is designed to boost the skills and confidence of those that will need to use SPSS in the course of their research project. The book is pedagogically well developed and contains many screen dumps and exercises, glossary terms, and worked examples

The impact of innovation contest briefs on the quality of solvers and solutions

As firms increasingly adopt online contests to improve their innovation projects, research is needed to determine which design factors make a contest successful. We examine the effects of the innovation contest brief, the description of the problem and the requirements for the potential solutions on contest performance. We focus on the length and readability of the brief and test both their effects on contest performance with a dataset containing almost 4000 online contests. Both brief readability and brief length are found to have direct and indirect effects on contest performance, and their indirect effects are determined by the effects on the number of high-skilled and low-skilled solvers that a contest attracts. Furthermore, the combined effects of both brief characteristics are positive, and these effects increase as the brief becomes more readable and longer. Finally, we find that both high-skilled and low-skilled solvers can submit high-quality solutions, but the likelihood of this is significantly higher for high-skilled solvers. This study provides clear evidence that briefs affect contest performance, making them an important element in the design of innovation contests

To be entrepreneurial, or not to be entrepreneurial? Explaining differences in franchisee entrepreneurial behavior within a franchise system

Although franchising scholars largely acknowledge that franchisees may behave like entrepreneurs, little is known about whether and why franchisees differ in their entrepreneurial behaviors. Franchisees are semi-autonomous entrepreneurs running geographically dispersed units within established organizations. We therefore use corporate entrepreneurship (CE) literature to define and measure franchisee entrepreneurial behavior, and we build on an entrepreneurial motivation framework to develop an integrative set of hypotheses that explain differences in franchisee entrepreneurial behavior. We test these hypotheses using survey data on 119 franchisees within a single Dutch franchise system. Our results show that the extent of franchisee entrepreneurial behavior varies considerably, even within a single franchise system. The differences in franchisees' entrepreneurial behaviors can be explained by differences in franchisees' intrinsic goals, relational satisfaction and local competition