Internet Marketing

The Internet and related technologies have broad application across many different areas of marketing. Many successful organisations use Internet marketing to complement and extend established offline marketing activities. Others have developed completely new business models, sometimes transforming whole industries in the process. Thus, understanding the theory and practice of Internet marketing has become an essential element of modern marketing.

‘The key question is not whether to deploy Internet technology – companies have no choice if they want to stay competitive – but how to deploy it.’ Porter (2001)”

Internet: The physical network that links computers across the globe. It consists of the infrastructure of network servers and communication links between them, which are used to hold and transport the vast amount of information on the internet. The Internet enables transfer of messages and transactions between connected computers world-wide.”
Chaffey et al (2000 pg 486)

The World Wide Web is just one channel in the Internet. The World Wide Web uses the Internet to connect different Servers (holding information / websites) to end users (PC’s receiving / web pages). Servers generally use the Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) to parse web pages in a common computer language called Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML) through Browser Software such as Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape Communicator. There are other uses or channels which are commonly used on the internet most notably email, File Transfer Protocols (FTP) and USENET or Newsgroups, but the important point is to understand that the Internet provides the infrastructure for those channels or services to function.

“World Wide Web: A medium for publishing information on the Internet. It is accessed through web browsers, which display web pages and can now be used to run business applications. Company information is stored on web servers, which are usually referred to as web sites.”
Chaffey et al (2000 pg 495)

Historically the internet is not a new technology, as it can be seen from the definition that it originates from the 1960′s. Probably the most important issue is to note that the Internet was developed in the 1960′s by the United States defence sector but it was not until 1989 that HTML and consequently the World Wide Web was invented by a British Scientist called Tim Berners-Lee, enabling a common language of communication and then in 1993, Mosaic software was developed by Mark Andreeson, which importantly allowed anyone to view HTML pages which included the use of images. It is at that point that the World Wide Web showed its true potential in terms of consumer marketing communication. More importantly, in recent years since the Internet’s growth and acceptance around the world the nature, type and size of products used to send and receive information has significantly expanded from personal computers to laptops, digital television, mobile phones and personal organisers.

Not everyone agrees about the significance of the Internet however,

“The Internet provides a fundamentally different economic environment for doing business, its key differentiator being rapid communication of information, accessible globally, and at negligible cost.” Rayman-Bacchus & Molina (2001 page 590)

“We need to move away from the rhetoric about ‘internet industries’ … and see the Internet for what it is: an enabling technology – a powerful set of tools that can be used, wisely or unwisely, in almost any industry and as part of almost any strategy.” Porter (2001)

There is clearly a difference in opinion between Rayman-Bacchus & Molina (2002) and the views of Porter (2001). The two articles are very different in their approach which may highlight reasons for the differences. Although they are close together in terms of publication date, Rayman-Bacchus & Molina (2002) base their discussion around a piece of research relating to tourism. Porter (2001) on the other hand is not really research as most would understand it. It is a peer reviewed article but no primary research was carried out to largely substantiate the claims he is making. At times it is rather self indulgent but acceptable given the reputation of the author.

The topic revolves around whether the Internet is a tool of the business or whether the Internet is a completely different environment. The answer propbably lies somewhere between the two. There are businesses that thrive on the Internet, some that are more legitimate and acceptable than others. Some businesses have been less successful on the internet.