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Effects of the internet on the marketing

communication of service companies


Stefan Lagrosen
Va xjo University, Va xjo , Sweden
Abstract
Purpose The purpose is to gain an understanding of how traditional service companies use the internet in their marketing communication and what
effect the internet has had on their use of other marketing communication channels.
Design/methodology/approach Multiple case studies have been carried out at 19 Swedish service companies.
Findings The ndings show that three different communications strategies are used depending on the scope of internet use and the extent to which
the companies utilise relationship marketing. Small or decentralised companies use the personalised relationship communication strategy. Large
companies have the option of using either the mass relationship communication strategy or the mass transaction communication strategy. The
characteristics of the strategies and their respective effects on the other marketing communications tools are described.
Research limitations/implications The conceptualisation of the communications strategies provides a framework that gives added understanding
and is useful for further studies.
Practical implications The presentation of the strategies and their implications should be useful for managers of service companies when planning
their communication activities. The managers will benet from making a conscious choice between the strategies and considering their features and
implications.
Originality/value The conceptualisation of the internet communications strategies provides a novel view of the communications options for service
rms. This framework is useful for further research and for managers of service rms.
Keywords Internet, Marketing communications, Services, Relationship marketing, Sweden
Paper type Research paper
An executive summary for managers and executive
readers can be found at the end of this article.
Introduction and purpose
During the so-called internet bubble all investments that
concerned the internet were strongly praised. So much so that
companies that based all or most of their activity on the web
were seen as visionaries. Developments during the last few
years have led to wide spread pessimism regarding all online
ventures. However, internet use is constantly increasing.
Notably, for young and well-educated people world-wide, it
has become the natural way of nding information. The
adoption of the internet is faster than it has been for any media.
Whereas it took 38 years for the radio and 13 years for the TV
to reach 50 million users, the internet achieved this level in only
ve years (Ellsworth and Ellsworth, 1997). This development
has to inuence the way marketing communication is and/or
should be conducted. Also, although the media focus has been
to a very high degree centred on companies that act solely on
the web, the internet might substantially effect companies that
sell their goods or services through traditional channels. It
should be interesting to see how these companies choose to use
the internet. Further, it should be valuable to nd out how the
advent of the internet has inuenced the use of the more
traditional marketing channels. Have the investments in
internet activities led to reductions in the use of traditional
marketing communication and have they changed the way that
traditional marketing communication is used? Many authors
emphasise the value of integrating different marketing
communication efforts (Burnett and Moriarty, 1998). Thus,
it should be of value to study if and how internet
communication is integrated in the traditional
communication mix. In this study we have chosen to
concentrate on service companies since much of the previous
focus has been on goods. Since services are high in information
content the internet should be particularly suitable to promote
and deliver services (Zinkhan, 2002). Services do not involve
transfer of ownership and they usually involve at least some
level of consumer participation in the production process
(Lovelock, 2000). For this reason the interactive possibilities
that the internet offers should have interesting implications.
The research question has been: how does the internet
inuence the marketing communication of traditional service
companies? The purpose has been to gain a preliminary
understanding of how traditional service companies use the
internet in their marketing communication and what effect the
internet has had on their use of other marketing
communication channels. Some delimitations have been
chosen. We decided to focus solely on private service
companies serving consumers and thus excluding business-
to-business companies and the service providing organisations
of the public sector. Further, we also chose to exclude
companies in the retailing and wholesaling industries since
these companies often also sell goods via the web and we
The Emerald Research Register for this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/researchregister
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0887-6045.htm
Journal of Services Marketing
19/2 (2005) 6369
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited [ISSN 0887-6045]
[DOI 10.1108/08876040510591376]
63
wanted to concentrate on online marketing communication
and avoid the intricacies of e-commerce in this study.
Internet marketing strategies
With the advent of the internet, many marketing communication
researchers realised that this new medium would bring new
opportunities for the marketing communication process
(Heinen, 1996). Some scholars even predict the death of the
traditional marketing function (Holbrook and Hulbert, 2002).
New strategies for internet marketing have been predicted
to include new ways of targeting, focusing on benets;
product strategy emphasising authenticity and promotion
based on well-managed websites (Aldridge et al., 1997). Since
the internet is a global medium, companies using it are always
potentially addressing international audiences. This might
lead to increased international competition (Wymbs, 2000).
There are also international differences in how the internet is
used for marketing. For instance a comparative study between
the UK, Australia and New Zealand showed that companies
in all three countries generally use the internet for marketing
communication whereas the use for transactions was much
lower in Australia and New Zealand (Adam et al., 2002).
In order that marketing communications efforts reach their
full potential they need to be integrated into a co-ordinated
framework (Burnett and Moriarty, 1998). Thus, internet
communication activities need to be integrated in the overall
marketing communications mix. They need also to be co-
ordinated with the operations of the company (Lovelock,
2000). In e-business, the very distinctions between marketing
communications and business operations also become more
diffuse especially at a strategic level (Rowley, 2001).
Recently, many marketing scholars have highlighted the value
of relations in marketing, stressing that traditional transactional
marketing needs to be replaced or complemented with new
frameworks that focus on the value of relations and interaction
(Gummesson, 1999). Due to the relational nature of services,
relations are particularly important for service companies
(Gro nroos, 2000). In the building and management of
relations, the interactivity of the internet makes it a
particularly useful tool. Among the relations that Gummesson
(1999) points to, the electronic relation is that which can be
created when companies and customers interact via the internet.
Several stages of e-marketing can be dened ranging from the
contact stage focusing only on promotion and information to the
relate stage when a two way relationship is established and the
internet is integrated into business operations (Rowley, 2001). A
fruitful relation, lock-on, can be created when customers choose
a company as their primary choice on a long term basis, which
many customers tend to do if they feel that the communication
and delivery is satisfactory (Vandermerwe, 1999).
In order to relate to customers via the web, companies need to
shift their focus from web presence and low price to delivering
electronic service quality (Zeithaml, 2002). For this purpose it is
crucial that the services are customised and personalised (Teo
and Tan, 2002). Often, supplementary services, which are more
relational, have a stronger bearing on customer satisfaction than
the core services (van Riel et al., 2001). Using the new
technology, companies need to continuously create new
supplementary value for the customers in order to build active
relations (Vandermerwe, 1999).
For relation-building the internet presents completely new
modes of interaction. One example is e-communities or virtual
communities in which people with a common interest carry out
their social discourse and activities using the internet (Barnatt,
1998; Sands, 2003). By participating in such communities
companies can go beyond one-to-one and develop many-to-
many communications (Maclaran and Catterall, 2002).
Another example is the moderated group chat in which
groups of customers interact in real time co-ordinated by a
company representative with a commercial motive (van Dolen
and de Ruyter, 2002). By using e-bulletins, newsletters
delivered via e-mail, the companies can keep the audience
informed about new features on their website (Sands, 2003).
Although the potential for relationship building based on
the internet exists, earlier studies indicate that relatively few
companies take advantage of these possibilities and that most
companies use the internet solely for informational purposes
(Arnott and Bridgewater, 2002). Many companies tend to
transfer direct marketing techniques to their online
communications effort neglecting the vital difference that
the internet is an interactive medium where the consumers
may adopt a far more dynamic role (Peters, 1998).
Methodology
Since the study is of an explorative nature, qualitative
methods were chosen for data collection. Due to the
intangible, variable and volatile nature of services,
qualitative methods are particularly valuable in this context
since they are better suited to handle ambiguous data
(Gilmore and Carson, 1996). We decided to use multiple case
studies on a number of service companies. This method does
not allow traditional statistical generalisation but analytical
generalisation may be possible when multiple cases support
the same theory (Yin, 1989). The sample was not decided in
advance. Instead we worked towards theoretical saturation
(Glaser, 1992; Glaser and Strauss, 1967). We wanted to
include a wide spectrum of private service companies but in
accordance with the delimitation above we excluded business-
to-business services and companies in the retailing and
wholesaling industries. By the time that we judged that
saturation had been achieved, 19 companies had been
included. The companies are briey presented in Table I.
In the data collection we wanted to get access to data giving
a deep understanding of the companies activities. The
method that is normally considered to be most suitable for
this purpose is in-depth interviews (Patton, 1990). The
author trained students to carry out in-depth interviews.
Depending on the size of the company, the access and the
richness of the data from each interview, they carried out
between one and four interviews at each company. The total
number of interviews was 33. In order not to force the data,
the respondents were asked to speak freely about their use of
the internet and their view of the value of it. The data from
the interviews was analysed by the author with methods
inspired by the grounded theory approach (Glaser, 1992;
Glaser and Strauss, 1967; Strauss and Corbin, 1990).
Findings
When the empirical data was analysed with the help of the
constant comparative method (Glaser, 1992; Glaser and Strauss,
1967; Strauss and Corbin, 1990) six categories emerged:
(1) The value of online marketing communication.
(2) The extent of online marketing communication.
Effects of the internet on marketing communication
Stefan Lagrosen
Journal of Services Marketing
Volume 19 Number 2 2005 6369
64
(3) Centralisation vs decentralisation.
(4) Collaboration with external organisations.
(5) Measurements.
(6) The effect of internet activities on the use of other
communication tools.
The value of online marketing communication
Most companies argued that the greatest benet of the internet
compared to other communication tools is that it gives a
possibility for two-way communication. In this way
communication can become interactive and thus more
engaging for the customers as well as better suited to the
individual customers needs and wants. Some of the companies
encourage active communication by listing the e-mail addresses
of their staff in order that the customers may contact them
directly. Many of the companies also claim that the internet has
a value for their brand. For instance SEB, which is the bank
that uses online communication to the largest extent, claims
that this has given their brand a more modern touch. Another
of the advantages that several of the companies highlight is that
the internet is a very fast medium, which allows great exibility
in marketing communications.
Referring the values that the respondents pointed out to the
steps of the buying process in the most traditional of the hierarchy
of effects models, the AIDA model, (Fill, 2002) we nd that:
.
Attention: generally the respondents saw this as a
somewhat weak aspect of internet communication. It is
not really probable that prospective customers will come
across the website while surng aimlessly in the way that
people without purpose may come across traditional
advertising. This problem can be overcome through
banner advertising at popular websites and through
information and links from portals or other relevant
sites. Only very few of the interviewed companies use
banner advertising and then to a limited extent. On the
other hand, the hotels and travel agencies particularly
regard links from portals and tourism sites as an important
aspect of their communication. Often the companies rely
on traditional advertising to direct prospective customers
to their websites. This highlights the value of integration
of different communication tools.
.
Interest: this is one of the stronger aspects of the internet
sites. Once the prospective customers are there, the
companies can entice them with plenty of information and
inspiration in an interactive way. The content of the sites
can be renewed frequently so as to encourage repeat visits.
.
Desire: the ample possibilities for publishing elaborate
material and interactive options on the internet give
companies plenty of opportunities to raise the desire of
prospective customers.
.
Action: also in this phase there are several possibilities for the
websites. Selective promotional offers can be posted on the
website or sent by e-mail. Through integration with a
customer card system, like that of SAS, these offers can even
be completely customised to match the interests of the
individual customers. Further, it is usually possible to actually
take action and book a journey or a hotel room or use the
services of insurance companies and banks on the net.
The extent of online marketing communication
All the studied companies utilise the internet for marketing
communication but the emphasis that is put on it varies.
Among the banks, SEB has a clearly stated ambition to
become the internet leader whereas Svenska Handelsbanken
puts considerably less emphasis on its online activities. This is
in line with both banks general communication practice,
which for SEB involves substantial marketing communication
in traditional channels while Svenska Handelsbanken relies
more on personal communication controlled by the separate
branch ofces.
Centralisation vs decentralisation
The issue of centralisation varies for the different companies.
Even the practices within the same industry vary considerably.
For instance, among the banks, the online communication of
SEB is completely centralised. Local campaigns are allowed
Table I The companies included in the study
Name Type Comment
SAS Airline The leading Scandinavian airline
Fo reningssparbanken Bank The largest bank in Sweden
Ikanobanken Bank A fairly new and small bank that is part of the IKEA group
SEB Bank Swedens oldest privately owned bank and one of the largest, especially in corporate nance
Svenska Handelsbanken Bank A large bank which is the most protable bank in Sweden
Ljuders vandrarhem Boarding-house A small boarding house with focus on older people
Toftastrand pensionat Boarding-house A company operating two large boarding-houses
First Hotel Cardinal Hotel A large modern hotel
Grand Hotell Hotel A large traditional hotel that is more than 100 years old
Petri Pumpa Hotell Hotel A small personal hotel that is a spin-off of a popular restaurant
Scandic Star Hotel Hotel A large modern hotel
Folksam Insurance company One of the largest insurance companies in Sweden with strong ties to the major trade union
La nsfo rsa kringar Insurance company The only insurance company in Sweden that is mutual and locally based
Apollo Travel agency An agency that originally focused only on tours to Greece but has recently expanded to other markets
Fritidsresor Travel agency A large well-established travel agency
Kilroy travels group Travel agency A travel agency with links to the students unions
Resia Travel agency A travel agency acting as an agent for other travel agencies
Tournee Travel agency A travel agency with its roots in motoring associations
Vingresor Travel agency A large well-established travel agency with a focus on family travel
Effects of the internet on marketing communication
Stefan Lagrosen
Journal of Services Marketing
Volume 19 Number 2 2005 6369
65
but they need to be approved by the group management in
each instance. In Svenska Handelsbanken, on the other hand,
much of the online communication is handled locally and
each of the individual branch ofces have their own local
website. In Fo reningssparbanken the policy is that all
activities that inuence the brand should be handled
centrally whereas the local branch ofces may handle their
practical activities separately.
Collaboration with external organisations
The hotels and boarding houses usually collaborate with other
organisations in order to enhance the possibility of reaching
the customers via their homepages. Particularly, it is usual to
get information on and links from different tourism and travel
websites and to be listed on hotel portals. For the smaller
hotels the costs of being listed on portals is, however,
sometimes a deterrent. Some of the hotels (First Hotel
Cardinal and Scandic Star Hotel) are owned by larger hotel
chains. Thus, they are to a certain extent dependent on those
larger organisations for their internet communication.
Measurements
The extent to which the effects of the internet communication
efforts are being measured varies. Those companies that
emphasise their online communication most, such as SEB, are
also most anxious to measure the effects of this investment even
if most of them realise the difculties of measuring such results.
Many of the other companies that have a more limited internet
activity, such as Svenska Handelsbanken, make no organised
efforts to measure the effects of the activities they have.
The effect on the use of other communication tools
Most companies believe that in the long run online
communication will increase its share of the total
communications budget. However, no company assumes that
it will completely substitute any of the traditional
communication channels. Presently, the majority of the
companies claim that the resources spent on the internet
have led to a negligible reduction on the amounts spent on
other communication tools. However, SEB has reduced its
advertising in daily newspapers signicantly as a result of their
massive investment in online activities. Some of the travel
agencies have managed to reduce the size of the catalogues that
traditionally are their main communication channel due to the
possibility of having more detailed information on the web.
An important issue is the integration of the internet with the
other communication channels. For instance, normally the
companies refer to their websites in all advertising. SAS has
integrated the use of internet communication with the
Eurobonus customer card system allowing the company to
offer customised offers to their customers via the web.
A communication strategy model
Analysing the ndings we found that a fairly coherent picture
emerged regardless of the industry. One dividing line between
the companies was the scope of the internet operations. In the
large and centralised companies such as SEB and SAS, the
internet operations are of completely different magnitude to
that of the small independent hotels. This is in line with
earlier research that has shown that small companies use
marketing differently from larger companies due to their
limitations on resources (Gilmore et al., 2001). In the large
but decentralised companies such as Svenska Handelsbanken
and Lansfo rsakringar the scope is in many aspects comparable
to that of the small companies.
The other major dividing line was between those
companies that focused heavily on relations and those that
concentrated less intensely on this issue. Although no
company said that it was not interested in relations,
systematised procedures for handling them was fairly
absent in some of the companies. This is apparently
related to their general marketing strategy. In the light of the
recent writings on relationship marketing many companies
have come to adopt this framework to a very high degree and
others have not. Departing from these two distinctions we
can dene four possible core communication strategies that
service companies use or could use (see Table II).
Since services are created in interaction between the
customer and the service provider, they are relational in their
nature and service companies should have a great tendency
to embrace relationship marketing (Gro nroos, 2000).
However, some of the large companies in this study such
as Fo reningssparbanken and Folksam showed relatively
limited focus on relations and their communication was
predominantly on the contact stage (Rowley, 2001). Thus
their communication strategy resembles mainly the mass
transaction communication strategy. Other large companies
such as SEB and SAS have a more explicit focus on relations
and their communications bear a resemblance to the relate
stage (ibid.). Their strategy can thus be characterised as a
mass relationship communication strategy. None of the small
or decentralised companies in this study has adopted a
strategy that can be characterised as transaction oriented.
Probably, it is difcult to conceive of a small service
company doing so. It should be possible for small goods
producing companies. However, for service companies that
need to be constantly in contact with a limited number of
customers this option is hardly viable. Thus the strategy that
the small or decentralised companies in this study have
adopted is the personalised relationship communication
strategy. It is interesting to note that the role of the customer
will be substantially different in the three strategies. In the
mass transaction communication strategy, the customers
have the traditional, rather passive role and the role of the
communication is to lead them through a sequential process
from awareness to purchase such as in the AIDA model. In
the mass relationship communication strategy the objective
is to create relations with large numbers of customers. In
order to make the customers loyal, different membership
schemes such as the SAS customer card system are
particularly useful. Following such schemes in which their
only interest is commercial the customers become pseudo-
members as opposed to the genuine membership that people
obtain when engaging in associations for idealistic or
personal development reasons (Gummesson, 1999). Still
such pseudo-membership is reasonable as long as it brings
commercial or other benets to both parties. For smaller
companies the network of the managers are particularly
important for market success (Gilmore et al., 2001).
Sometimes social networks may be equally important as
traditional business contacts (Gummesson, 1999). Thus, in
the personalised relationship communication strategy the
customers take the role of partners in the network. The
characteristics of the three strategies that are used are listed
in Table III.
Effects of the internet on marketing communication
Stefan Lagrosen
Journal of Services Marketing
Volume 19 Number 2 2005 6369
66
Managerial implications
For managers of service companies it should be valuable to
make a conscious choice regarding the strategies presented
above. Service companies that are small or decentralised do
not, however, have any real option in our opinion. They
should develop the personalised relationship communication
strategy utilising the features presented above. For large
centralised companies two options are possible. The
proponents of relationship marketing would argue that the
mass relationship communication strategy should be the
natural option. In this case use of an advanced, elaborated
website with effective interactive opportunities should be
very valuable. Also the other tools mentioned in Table III
should be considered. However, some large companies may
possibly gain from choosing the mass transaction
communication strategy. In that case, this should probably
be coupled with cost leadership. In this option it will be
particularly important that the internet activities are co-
ordinated with and supported by traditional advertising and
sales promotion.
Conclusions, limitations and suggestions for
future research
The study has shown that the internet communication strategies
of Swedish service companies can be characterised according to
three different options. The mass transaction communications
strategy is used by some large companies. Other large
companies have opted more for the use of relationship
marketing in their marketing communication and in
consequence they follow the mass relationship communication
strategy. For the small companies it has been found that they all
follow the personalised relationship communication strategy. It
is argued that this is the only reasonable choice for them since
small service companies probably need to focus on relations.
Some of the large companies have adopted a greatly
decentralised organisational structure. The communication
strategy that their sub-units utilise has been found to resemble
that of the small service companies.
There are a number of limitations to the ndings of the
study. One is that only Swedish companies have been studied.
The possibilities of generalising the ndings to other countries
Table II Core communications strategies
Transaction-oriented marketing strategy Relations-oriented marketing strategy
Large centralised service company Mass transaction communication strategy Mass relationship communication strategy
Small or decentralised service
company
Limited transaction communications strategy
(improbable position)
Personalised relationship communication
strategy
Table III Summary of the implications of the strategies
Mass transaction communication
strategy
Mass relationship communication
strategy
Personalised relationship communication
strategy
Main objective Creating the maximum number of
transactions
Creating a massive amount of protable
relations
Creating a limited amount of very protable
relations
Main value of
the internet
Values as described in the traditional
AIDA model. Stimulating purchases through
enticing content
An interactive mass communications tool.
Highly interactive web pages, automatically
personalised through the
use of cookie les
An aid in the personal communication between
the personnel of the service provider and the
customers. E-mail and local web sites are most
useful
Additional
features and
possibilities
Banner advertising is an additional
option
Integrating the websites with customer
cards or other membership schemes should
be particularly useful. Moderated group
chats, e-communities and e-bulletins may
be valuable
For the small company, presence at portals and
other relevant sites is important. The internet
becomes a means for handling their networking
activities. For the decentralised company,
co-ordination between the central head
ofce and the local branches is vital. Local
e-communities may be of use
Role of the
customers
Traditional role Pseudo members Partners
Effects on the
companies
other
communications
tools
Traditional tools are used to direct
customers to the website. It is important
that the messages in the traditional
advertising are co-ordinated with the offers
on the website
To a certain extent traditional advertising
and sales promotion can be substituted by
the website
The internet becomes more of a substitute to
other personal communications tools such as
telephone, fax, etc.
Main basis for
measurement
Amount of sales generated Number of regular users Protability of each individual user
Effects of the internet on marketing communication
Stefan Lagrosen
Journal of Services Marketing
Volume 19 Number 2 2005 6369
67
are unknown. Although the context in many western
countries is probably fairly similar, generalisations can only
be made with substantial caution. Further research in other
countries and particularly cross-country comparisons should
therefore be valuable. The choice of the empirical eld
provides another limitation. Research in the goods sector and
in retail services would also be useful for a more complete
understanding of this area.
Furthermore, while the three strategies have been identied
and described, the consequences for economic and market
success remain unknown. For instance, can a large service
company obtain sustainable protability by choosing the mass
transaction communication strategy or is the mass
relationship communication strategy superior? This will be
an interesting area for future research.
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Zinkhan, G.M. (2002), Promoting services via the internet:
new opportunities and challenges, Journal of Services
Marketing, Vol. 16 No. 5, pp. 412-23.
Executive summary and implications for
managers and executives
This summary has been provided to allow managers and executives
a rapid appreciation of the content of this article. Those with a
particular interest in the topic covered may then read the article in
toto to take advantage of the more comprehensive description of the
research undertaken and its results to get the full benets of the
material present.
Lagrosen investigates how 19 traditional Swedish service
companies from leading Scandinavian airline SAS to a small
boarding house and from Swedens largest bank
Foreningssparbanken to a mutually owned and locally based
Effects of the internet on marketing communication
Stefan Lagrosen
Journal of Services Marketing
Volume 19 Number 2 2005 6369
68
insurance company use the internet in their marketing
communication and what effect the internet has had on their
use of other marketing communication channels. The research
reveals that three different communication strategies are used
depending on the scope of internet use and the extent to which
companies use relationship marketing.
Mass transaction communication strategy
Large companies have the option of using a mass relationship
communication strategy or a mass transaction communication
strategy. Firms using the latter place relatively little
importance on fostering interaction with customers over the
internet. Instead, they focus their internet communication on
the contact stage and aim to create the maximum number of
transactions. The main value of the internet, for these
companies, is in stimulating purchases through enticing
content, although banner advertising is an additional option.
Other, more traditional communication tools are also used to
direct customers to the website. The messages in the
traditional advertising should, however, be co-ordinated
with the offers on the website. Customers have a traditional,
rather passive role, and the role of the internet
communication is to lead them through a sequential process
from awareness to purchase. Success is measured by the
amount of sales generated.
Mass relationship communication strategy
Companies opting for a mass relationship communication
strategy, in contrast, have a more explicit focus on creating
protable relations with large numbers of customers over the
internet. One example is the SAS customer card system,
designed to make the airlines customers more loyal.
Moderated group chats, e-communities and e-bulletins may
also be valuable. For these companies, the main value of the
internet is as an interactive mass communications tool, and
the main basis for measuring success is the number of regular
users. The rms should seek to have highly interactive web
pages, automatically personalised through the use of cookie
les. To a certain extent, these rms can replace traditional
advertising and sales promotion by the website.
Personalised relationship communication strategy
A personalised relationship communication strategy, whose
main objective is creating a limited number of very protable
relationships, is more appropriate for small or decentralised
rms. Under this strategy, the main value of the internet is as
an aid in the personal communication between customers
who are often seen as partners and the service providers
employees. E-mail and local websites are most useful. For the
small company, presence at portals and other relevant sites is
important. The internet becomes a means for handling their
networking activities. For the decentralised company, co-
ordination between head ofce and the local branches is vital.
Local e-communities may be of value. For rms using a
personalised relationship communication strategy, the
internet partially substitutes other personal communications
tools such as the telephone or facsimile machine. The
protability of each individual user is the main basis for
measuring success.
(A precis of the article Effects of the internet on the marketing
communication of service companies. Supplied by Marketing
Consultants for Emerald.)
Effects of the internet on marketing communication
Stefan Lagrosen
Journal of Services Marketing
Volume 19 Number 2 2005 6369
69

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