Performance evaluation of tourism websites' information quality of four global destination brands: Beijing, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Taipei

Some tourists only have a slight idea of where they want to go on a holiday when planning starts. Such tourists or their travel partners are likely to look for information for making a final travel decision. As the web becomes an increasingly popular information source, tourism destination websites can play a critical role in destination choice. A rubric for comparing tourism websites put forward by Dion and Woodside (2010) is used and ideas for enhancing the rubric are introduced utilizing a growing literature. Comparisons are made for the tourism websites of Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, and Taipei. Analysis involves considering websites' quality and usefulness. The study indicates that Hong Kong's site is best while Beijing has the most room for improvement The paper concludes with implications of the research for website analysis. The discussion includes contributions to the value of criteria for websites found in the literature but not covered in an information-quality performance rubric. (C) 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.