1 Evaluating website quality of tourism websites: A study of Australian and Malaysian consumers Romana Garma and Olga Junek Victoria University ABSTRACT The study examined consumers' evaluation of websites from which tourism and travel related products had been purchased. The sample, for this study, were Australians and Malaysians residing in Melbourne and Kuala Lumpur, respectively. The respondents were asked to rate certain criteria such as aesthetic appearance, interactive features, speed and efficiency, security and convenience of the web site. Personal interviews were conducted to determine the dimensions of website quality. The findings reveal that the demographic characteristics of Australian and Malaysian who purchase tourism product over the Internet do not differ. Seven dimensions of website quality were identified with design, innovativeness and trust representing the best predictors of satisfaction with tourism websites. Keywords: website quality, satisfaction, tourism, on-line INTRODUCTION The importance of tourism has been recognised by a large number of authors within tourism literature as well as tourism organisations such as the World Tourism Organisation (WTO). For many countries, tourism has made significant contributions to their economies, infrastructure and tourism investments along with an increased destination brand awareness (Theobald 2002; Leiper 2004; WTO 2005; WTTC 2005). Globalisation of tourism and increase in travel activity has been made possible by a rise in disposable income (especially in a number of Asian countries such as India, China and Thailand), advances in technology, rising education levels and increased media and marketing activities of destinations (Swarbrooke and Horner 1999; Buhalis 2001). The growth of tourism together with the advances in Internet Computer Technology (ICT) has impacted considerably on the demand and supply aspects of the tourism industry. At present, consumers travelling and consuming travel products have more access to pre-travel information, an increased supply of travel and tourism products and a wide choice in how to purchase these products. Tourists are continually faced with making decisions about where to travel, what type of accommodation to use, what tourist activities to undertake, and also how best to purchase these. Use of the Internet for shopping and information searching gives the consumer a wide range of information, more product choice selection, competitive prices and ease of purchase (Kierkegaard & Kierkegaard 2005). Hence new challenges are presented for tourism suppliers and destination marketing organisations as consumers search for travel products online amidst an ever-increasing number of competing products and websites marketing these. (Swarbrooke and Horner 1999; Vanhove 2001; Cai, Feng & Breiter 2004). Assessing the quality of websites, whether consciously or unconsciously, plays a large role in the potential consumer's decision making process and can ultimately lead to a rejection of the website and the product based on this assessment. Understanding the dimensions of website quality and the resultant satisfaction or dissatisfaction of consumers who use the Internet can help tourism and travel providers to improve their website by focusing on those dimensions that are important to the consumer. RESEARCH AIM The study aims to explore the consumers' evaluation of web sites from which travel and leisure products were purchased and to ascertain whether any differences exist between Malaysian and Australian consumers.