نقش در حال تحول اینترنت در استراتژی بازاریابی : مطالعه اکتشافی

This research investigates the evolution of Internet marketing strategies in a longitudinal, exploratory study. The key research questions are “How does Internet strategy evolve over time, and what factors seem to drive this evolution?” To investigate these questions, we conducted in-depth interviews of senior managers at three manufacturing companies (Reebok International, Saturn, AB Dick) competing in different industries. By comparing past and current practices, we find that applications of Internet marketing strategy involve more than just e-commerce. Our research indicates that firms are using the Internet for creating value chain efficiencies, reducing costs, and enhancing customer and channel relationships.

The Internet represents a significant change in the competitive landscape. Scholarly research has devoted considerable attention to this new marketing medium. Extant research has fo- cused on such issues as the Internet as a com- munication medium (e.g., Hoffman & Novak, 1996), electronic business markets enabled by the Internet (e.g., Grewal, Comer, & Mehta, 2001), and the proposed effects of firms’ use of the Internet on trust development (e.g., Sawh- ney & Zabin, 2002; Sultan et al., 2002; Urban, Sultan, & Qualls, 2000). Other research has examined industry structure, product charac- teristics, and the relative advantages of online buying contexts and efficiencies (e.g., Balasu- bramanian, Krishnan, & Sawhney, 2000; Lynch & Ariely, 2000). In addition, conceptual work has addressed competitive strategy issues re- lated to the Internet (e.g., Varadarajan & Yadav, 2002). In practice, decisions regarding channel structure and strategy, particularly with respect to new technologies such as the Internet, can be critical to firms’ success or failure. Surprisingly, given the significant body of research in this area, there is little empirical work that provides insights as to how firms’ Internet strategies may evolve over time. Moreover, there is a lack of research that examines the drivers of this evo- lution. Insight into these areas will help guide theory building and managerial understanding of marketing strategy across multiple channels. The purpose of this exploratory study is to understand how organizations have sought to incorporate the Internet in their marketing strategy over time. In this study, we compare the findings from an initial study conducted during the height of the dot-com boom in 2000 (Rohm & Milne, 2003), based on interviews with key managers and executives regarding Internet strategy, with a study conducted in 2002. Our key research question is “How does Internet strategy evolve over time, and what factors drive this evolution?” By examining issues of Internet strategy over time, we can begin to understand how specific Internet initiatives can help achieve firms’ overall strategic objectives. In addition, we aim to identify future Internet initia- tives and hurdles to the implementation of suc- cessful Internet strategies. This longitudinal, exploratory investigation is based on three case studies involving in-depth interviews of managers. This extends recent re- search by providing a longitudinal examination of firms’ Internet strategies and how those strat- egies have shifted over time. The contributions of this study are threefold: (a) We provide a longitudinal examination of firm-level Internet strategy across industries, (b) we propose a con- ceptual framework that identifies shifts in Inter- net strategy over time, and (c) we identify the factors that drive this evolution and the hurdles firms face in implementing Internet initiatives. We begin by summarizing the main results from the initial study conducted in 2000 and related themes from the literature, followed by a review of our research methodology, which employs in-depth interviews with managers. We then describe the findings and propose a con- ceptual framework. Next, we discuss the impli- cations of this study. Finally, we present conclu- sions, limitations, and directions for future research.

The major contribution of this study is that it offers a longitudinal view of the evolution of Internet marketing strategy at three firms com- peting in diverse industries. This study exam- ined how Internet strategy has evolved across two periods of Internet usage: (a) an initial phase characterized by high expectations of the benefits to be derived from firms’ adoption of the Internet; and (b) a latter phase in which these expectations have given way to reality, and where companies began to realize that Internet strategy must be developed and executed with close regard for existing channel structure and channel members. Overall, this study provides a greater under- standing of how firms’ Internet strategy initiatives have evolved and what the drivers of this evolution might be as well as the ways in which these initiatives are being employed to achieve specific strategic corporate objectives. Internet strategies are dynamic, and managers need to recognize that there is no one single template for successful Internet strategy. This study illustrates the need for research to investigate radical innovations such as the Inter- net over time. Related to the work by Venkatra- man (2000), our findings support the conten- tion that companies’ Internet strategy and usage follow a series of stages whereby firms shift current strategy as needed through learn- ing and experimentation. From a relationship- marketing perspective, our findings also sup- port the concept (see Sawhney & Zabin, 2002) of the Internet as a medium with which to es- tablish and enhance customer and channel re- lationships rather than as a medium to elimi- nate channel partners. In addition, there is a need to identify performance metrics that allow us to explicitly test the impact of particular Internet initiatives on specific corporate objec- tives. Recent emphasis on marketing Return on Investment (ROI), found both in academe and industry, supports the need for such metrics. In interpreting these findings, it is important to be aware that the data for this research are based upon practices, experiences, and percep- tions of managers at three firms and industries. The relevance of these findings may be limited to those firms competing in industries and mar- ket settings that share characteristics similar to the sample. Future research should include a wider range of companies to enhance the rele- vance of these findings to other firms and in- dustries. Further, the qualitative insights from this study can serve as a stepping stone for future model building and testing. This could be accomplished by building causal models based on the proposed framework and generat- ing survey-based quantitative data.