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Stanford Guidelines for Web Credibility
How can you boost your web site's credibility?
We have compiled 10 guidelines for building the credibility of aweb site. These guidelines are based on three years of research that includedover 4,500 people.
| Guideline | AdditionalComments | Supporting Research from our lab | | 1. | Make it easy to verify the accuracy of the informationon your site. | | You can build website credibility by providing third-party support (citations, references,source material) for information you present, especially if you link to thisevidence. Even if people don't follow these links, you've shown confidencein your material. | chi00, chi01a, ptl02, unp | | 2. | Show that there's a real organization behind yoursite. | | Showing that yourweb site is for a legitimate organization will boost the site's credibility.The easiest way to do this is by listing a physical address. Other featurescan also help, such as posting a photo of your offices or listing a membershipwith the chamber of commerce. | chi00, chi01a, chi01b, ptl02 | | 3. | Highlight the expertise in your organization and inthe content and services you provide. | | Do you have expertson your team? Are your contributors or service providers authorities? Besure to give their credentials. Are you affiliated with a respected organization?Make that clear. Conversely, don't link to outside sites that are notcredible. Your site becomes less credible by association. | acm99, chi99, chi00, chi01a, chi01b, ptl02, unp | | 4. | Show that honest and trustworthy people stand behindyour site. | | The first part ofthis guideline is to show there are real people behind the site and in theorganization. Next, find a way to convey their trustworthiness through imagesor text. For example, some sites post employee bios that tell about familyor hobbies. | chi99, chi01b, unp | | 5. | Make it easy to contact you. | | A simple way to boostyour site's credibility is by making your contact information clear: phone number, physical address, and email address. | chi00, chi01a, ptl02, unp | | 6. | Design your site so it looks professional (or is appropriatefor your purpose). | | We find that peoplequickly evaluate a site by visual design alone. When designing your site,pay attention to layout, typography, images, consistency issues, and more.Of course, not all sites gain credibility by looking like IBM.com. The visualdesign should match the site's purpose. | chi99, chi00, chi01a, ptl02, unp | | 7. | Make your site easy to use -- and useful. | | We're squeezing twoguidelines into one here. Our research shows that sites win credibility pointsby being both easy to use and useful. Some site operators forget about userswhen they cater to their own company's ego or try to show the dazzling thingsthey can do with web technology. | acm99, chi99, chi00, chi01a, ptl02, unp | | 8. | Update your site's content often (at least show it'sbeen reviewed recently). | | People assign morecredibility to sites that show they have been recently updated or reviewed. | chi00, chi01a, ptl02, unp | | 9. | Use restraint with any promotional content (e.g.,ads, offers). | | If possible, avoidhaving ads on your site. If you must have ads, clearly distinguish the sponsoredcontent from your own. Avoid pop-up ads, unless you don't mind annoying usersand losing credibility. As for writing style, try to be clear, direct, andsincere. | chi00, chi01a, chi01b, ptl02, unp | | 10. | Avoid errors of all types, no matter how small theyseem. | | Typographical errorsand broken links hurt a site's credibility more than most people imagine.It's also important to keep your site up and running. | acm99, chi99, chi00, chi01a, chi01b, ptl02, unp | | For more information, contact [email protected] | Suggested Citation |
| Fogg, B.J. (May 2002). "Stanford Guidelines for Web Credibility." A Research Summary from the Stanford Persuasive TechnologyLab. Stanford University. www.webcredibility.org/guidelines | | | Research | Details | | acm99 | | Title | "Credibility and Computing Technology" | | Authors | Shawn Tseng & B.J. Fogg | | Source | Communications of the ACM, vol.42, issue 5 (May 1999), pp. 39-44. | | Online | http://captology.stanford.edu/pdf/p39-tseng.pdf | | | chi99 | | Title | "The Elements of Computer Credibility" | | Authors | B.J. Fogg & Shawn Tseng | | Source | Proceedings of ACM CHI 99 Conferenceon Human Factors in Computing Systems, v.1, pp. 80-87.New York: ACM Press. | | Online | http://captology.stanford.edu/pdf/p80-fogg.pdf | | | chi00 | | Title | "Elements that Affect Web Credibility:Early Results from a Self-Report Study" | | Authors | B.J. Fogg, Jonathan Marshall, Othman Laraki,Alex Osipovich, Chris Varma, Nicholas Fang, Jyoti Paul,Akshay Rangnekar, John Shon, Preeti Swani, & MarissaTreinen | | Source | Proceedings of ACM CHI 2000 Conferenceon Human Factors in Computing Systems, v.2, New York:ACM Press. | | Online | No online source yet | | | chi01a | | Title | "What Makes A Web Site Credible? A Reporton a Large Quantitative Study" | | Authors | B.J. Fogg, Jonathan Marshall, Othman Laraki,Alex Osipovich, Chris Varma, Nicholas Fang, Jyoti Paul,Akshay Rangnekar, John Shon, Preeti Swani, & MarissaTreinen | | Source | Proceedings of ACM CHI 2001 Conferenceon Human Factors in Computing Systems, v. 1, 61-68.New York: ACM Press. | | Online | http://captology.stanford.edu/pdf/p61-fogg.pdf | | | chi01b | | Title | "Web Credibility Research: A Method forOnline Experiments and Some Early Study Results" | | Authors | B.J. Fogg, Jonathan Marshall, Tami Kameda,Joshua Solomon, Akshay Rangnekar, John Boyd, & BonnyBrown | | Source | Proceedings of ACM CHI 2001 Conferenceon Human Factors in Computing Systems, v.2. New York:ACM Press. | | Online | http://captology.stanford.edu/pdf/WebCred%20Fogg%20CHI%202001%20short%20paper.PDF | | | ptl02 | | Title | "Stanford-Makovsy Web Credibility Study2002: Investigating What Makes Web Sites Credible Today" | | Authors | B.J. Fogg, Tami Kameda, John Boyd, JonathanMarshall, Ramit Sethi, & Mike Sockol | | Source | Report from the Persuasive TechnologyLab (not peer reviewed) | | Online | http://captology.stanford.edu/pdf/Stanford-MakovskyWebCredStudy2002-prelim.pdf | | | unp | | Unpublishedresearch |
| Our lab has done research that is not published, such as student honors theses, class projects, and pilotstudies. If we make this work public in the future, you'llfind it at webcredibility.org. | |
| Research on Web Credibility: | - Click here to visit the Stanford Web Credibility ResearchSite by the Stanford Persuasive Tech Lab.
Copyright © Stanford Persuasive Technology Lab, 2004 | |
