A framework for evaluating World Wide Web directories

The advent of the World Wide Web and its popularity us a hypermedia communications medium has raised a great deal of interest in its use for commercial activities. Business user difficulties in finding product and service information on the Web have resulted in the development of a number of specialized Web business directories to support business-to-business transfers of product and service information. In some cases ancillary services such as Electronic Data Interchange am also provided. This paper examines issues related to the business procurement cycle, develops a classification system for Web business directories, and relates directory use in these classifications to support of the procurement process.