ATTRACTORS - BUILDING MOUNTAINS IN THE FLAT LANDSCAPE OF THE WORLD-WIDE-WEB

Advocates of the World Wide Web claim it is a great-leveler and that p articipants have a more equal voice. This flatness of the Web creates a major challenge for many businesses: How do you attract visitors and prospective customers to the firm's Web site? The Web site that can a ttract more visitors, all other things being equal, is more likely to communicate its message to a wider audience or sell its product to mor e people. Organizations want to build mountains-or ''attractors''-in t he otherwise flat landscape of Web-based marketing and advertising. Th is article classifies existing approaches to creating attractors, iden tifies four basic types of attractors, and predicts that there will be a move towards creating highly interactive attractors as a device for mass customization. The article also addresses the notion of sustaina ble attractiveness and presents recommendations for designing an attra ctor.