The cultural adaptation of web design to local industry styles: A comparative study

This article looks to the tendency of a country’s crafts and industries to produce in a particular industry style. Industry styles are value-expressive, often established through implicit design features that companies apply undeliberately. Two studies are carried out on the web design of small and medium sized ICT companies in Germany and Spain. The first study shows how industry styles can be understood and designed as expressive of a country’s value orientation. It thus provides a method for design according to a local industry style. The second study demonstrates the effectiveness of cultural adaptation to an industry style. It shows that users in Germany and Spain find web pages with industry styles adapted to local culture more trustworthy and appealing.

► A country’s industry has the tendency to produce in a particular style.
► Industry styles express values, even if often left implicit.
► We develop and validate a method for creating websites in a local industry style.
► We examine how to adapt websites to a local industry style in Germany and Spain.
► Websites in Spanish or German industry styles are more trusted and liked locally.