Applying RFM Model to Evaluate the E-loyalty for Information-based Website

Due to the progress of website applications, many online services without commercial transactions have been widely implemented recently. The potential of and the indirect business opportunities from those applications have made measuring website performance an important issue. In electronic commerce, the e-loyalty development process is based on both e-satisfaction and e-trust toward the net-enabled business. In order to evaluate the online loyalty of users toward other websites, we expand the definition of e-loyalty as “a favorable attitude toward an online service provider resulting in repeat browsing behavior.” As browsing behavior is different from traditional purchasing behavior, we also propose a browsing RFM model to define what a browsing transaction is and to extract the browsing features of visitors to the site from the server log file. The e-loyalty of each individual is evaluated and the browsing pattern of members is identified in our proposed model. In addition, an empirical case study is performed to demonstrate how this procedure works. Moreover, further applications of this research are provided for improved online experience.