Organizational Website Usability and Attractiveness Effects on Viewer Impressions

Previous research on the rapidly growing field of Internet recruitment has operated under the implicit assumption that recruitment websites can and do influence viewers ’ opinions of recruiting organizations. This study empirically tested this assumption using a pre/post-test experimental design. Results indicated that viewers ’ ratings on company familiarity, favorability, image as an employer, and organizational attractiveness were affected by organizations ’ recruitment websites. Moreover, changes in viewers ’ evaluations of these companies were directly related to the usability and attractiveness of their websites. Specifically, greater increases in favorable evaluations from the pre- to post-test measures occurred with companies that maintained websites that were easy to navigate and that were appealing in terms of their colors, fonts, and images. The use of the Internet for recruiting by organizations has been on the rise throughout the past decade. Recent survey results indicate that approximately 90 % of large companies have official recruitment web pages (Cappelli, 2001) and that these pages are the second most frequently visited sections (after the home page) of a company’s website (Peters, 2001). Moreover, companies in both the private and public sectors use their websites to recruit applicants more than for any other human resource management activity (Elliot & Tevavichulada, 1999). Despite the widespread use of the Internet for organizational recruitment, research on the efficacy of this medium lags considerably behind practice. For these reasons, several authors have called for increased research on Interne