Marketing through the Internet

The Internet is a very attractive marketing tool with the possibility to customize pages, as well as new promotional systems, giving firms the possibility of communication and promotion effectively by adapting to consumers’ likings. For instance, some car manufacturers ask Internet users for concrete information and in return give potential customers a $1,000 discount coupon or a free CD player coupon. Advancement can be targeted towards a customer’s particular interests and hobbies very easily. Besides, “web currency” assists effective advancements. Some sites like Smart Frog.com suggest using web-based currency to buy online.

It should also be stressed that the use of e-mail for marketing aims allows companies to perform better-targeted advancements. An online music store, targets particular users who like jazz or hip hop fans with special suggestions. Also, email suggests a wide scope of personalized communications with consumers, and online retailers are various: e-mail based on HTML gives a more dynamic way to provide data, it is cheaper than printing and mailing customary marketing material, and is easier to provide a customer with data. To make easier marketers’ lives even more, straight marketing e-mail service providers suggest specialized marketing e-mail programs. Nevertheless, using e-mail means the threat to be taken as a spammer. In order to prevent this, firms should only give on-demand quality content that users have asked for. Besides, marketers never should send unsolicited messages, because anti-spam software that blocks unnecessary marketing messages will kill their attempts.

It is obvious that Internet marketing is a supplement to traditional marketing. A Web site does not replace the traditional marketing, but improves the marketing program just in place. Advertising, personal purchase, sales advancement are all supported by Internet marketing attempts. For instance, in the hotel industry, Frank Passanante, manager of sales and marketing, states that Web marketing supports other collaterals to inform consumers of the product, and online reservations are a great supplementary sales tool.

The Internet can be viewed a supplement to traditional data marketing materials, books. For instance, consumers go online to find data about the product. This is especially true for technical products, demanding advice and time for making the decision. For instance, a Nikon digital camera received 60,000 mouse clicks in three months for a month 1998, on the Imaging Resources web site, an independent Internet marketing firm that supplies product data and sample pictures for consumers examining digital cameras and scanners.