The State Of Japanese Consumer Electronics Site Design, 2007

As part of a study that looked at 12 major Japanese sites, Forrester recently used its Web Site Review methodology to evaluate the user experience at the Web sites of four major Japanese consumer electronics manufacturers: Panasonic, Sharp, Sony, and Toshiba. Japan's consumer electronics sites suffered from multiple problems such as page layouts that bury content, unclear menu titles, and problematic home pages. To succeed in a world of commoditized products, consumer electronics companies must focus their sites on supporting key user goals, design for self-directed users, and look outside of their industry for best practices to emulate.