Analyzing the Cultural Content of Websites： A Cross-cultural study of Technology Companies in the US and Japan

李雅楠

(郑州财经学院，河南 郑州450053)

Abstract：This research attempts to explore the depiction of cultural values on technology company web sites of US and Japan. A content analysis was conducted to study the specific cultural content on web sites of Japanese and US according to Hofstede theories. The results show that US technology company websites depict higher level of individualism features than Japan. While Japanese websites depict higher level of power distance features than US. Thus, marketers should consider the localization strategies of reflecting the cultural characteristics of a given country as to culturally customize their international websites.

Key word：technology websites, cross-cultural, localization

一、lntroduction

The Internet has emerged as one of the most effective marketing communication channels for corporations. This study attempts to investigate the cross-cultural differences conveyed by technology company web sites in Japan and US from the perspective of Hofstede’s two cultural dimensions (Hofstede, 1984).Whether culture plays an important role in web site design and to what extent the standardization or localization strategy should be adopted by marketers are important for Chinese corporations penetrating the US and Japanese markets.

二、Cultural influences and cross-cultural studies on website design

Studies have found that culturally sensitive web content can facilitate the efficiency of usability,accessibility, and web site interactivity (Fock, 2000；Simon, 2001). According to Luna et al. (2002), culturally appropriate web content decreases cognitive effort to process information on the site. Tang (2011)indicated that scenes of university’s buildings or campus are the main visual elements in China’s university websites, while the depictions of people are frequently used visuals in US university websites. The research confirmed that South Korean websites are more likely than U.S. websites to conform to polychronic time-management tendencies and preferences for high-context communication.

三、Research hypotheses

According to Hofstede(1984), countries sharing the same value of a given indicator are characterized by similar cultural backgrounds. As shown in the following Table 1, US scores higher in individualism dimension than Japan, while, Japan scores higher than US in uncertainty avoidance.

Table1 Parts of Value’s of Hofstede’s indicators

Individualism： Individualist cultures emphasize the loose ties between individuals, while collectivist cultures suggest that one’s identity is based upon the social system (Meng, 1999). Therefore：

H1：Local US technology company web sites will depict higher level of individualism-oriented features than Japanese web sites.

Uncertainty avoidance refers to the degree to which members of a society are willing to accept uncertainty and ambiguity (Hofstede, 1984). According to Hofstede’s model, US receives a lower UAI score than the Japan (Hofstede et al., 2010). Therefore,

H2：Local Japanese web sites will depict higher level of uncertainty-reducing features than the US web sites.

四、Methodology

This study adopts a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods to interpret the data meaningfully. The study uses content analysis to evaluate the cultural content in the local web sites of Japanese,and US technology companies. A T-test was used to analyze how local web sites of Japanese, and US technology companies differ in and the degree of the depiction of cultural values on web sites. 5 local US companies were selected from the 2018 Forbes list of top 500 list, namely, Apple, Microsoft, IBM, Intel, Cisco Systems. 5 local Japanese from the Forbes list of top 500, namely, Hitachi, Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, Canon.

五、Results and Discussion

To analyze how various cultural categories under each of the two cultural dimensions differed across the two countries, we conducted a t-test testing by cultural categories (see Table2). The results reveal that under the individualism dimension the most highly-depicted features found in US web sites are product uniqueness and web page personalization. US is obviously higher than Japan in categories of privacy, independence, product uniqueness and page personalization. “expect rapid, continuous improvements with always-enabled updates . ”(Source： www.microsoft.com).This illustrates the unique selling points and advantage of the product. “your privacy is important to Apple. So we’ve developed a Privacy Policy that covers how we collect, use, disclose, transfer and store your information.” (Source： www. apple.com). This illustrates privacy policy and how personal information will be protected.

In uncertainty avoidance dimension, Japan is significantly higher than US in the categories of testimonial and tradition. Sony in its products information page indicates that a calendar of world heritage in Japan will be a present for customers. This shows Sony’s respect for its traditional culture.

Table 2

On the individualism dimension, US technology company web sites are significantly higher in the depiction of individualistic values compared to Japanese tech company web sites. On uncertainty avoidance dimension, Japanese web sites score significantly higher than US web sites. Thus, H1 and H2 are both supported.The results indicate that local web sites of US and Japan reflect cultural values of the country of their origin. Marketer can use this validated cultural value framework as a practical tool to develop culturally adapted web sites, or analyze their international web sites to measure the degree of adaptation targeted toward a particular culture.