|
Communication with Customers
Online Until the late 1940s, when television began finding its way into American homes, companies relied mainly on print and radio to promote their products and services. The advent (出现) of television brought about a revolution in promoting products and services. Between 1949 and 1951 ,advertising on television grew 960 percent. Today the Internet is once again transforming promotion. By going online, companies can communicate instantly and directly with prospective customers. Promotion on the World Wide Web includes advertising, sponsorships and sales promotions like contests and coupons. In 1996, world wide web advertising revenues reached $ 300 million. Effective online marketers do not merely transfer hard-copy ads(平面广告) to cyberspace. Successful sites blend promotional and non-promotional information, indirectly delivering the advertising messages. To encourage visitors to their sites and to create and cultivate customers' loyalty, companies change information frequently and provide many opportunities for interaction. One of the best online promotion web sites is the Ragu Web site. Here visitors can find thirty six pasta recipes, take Italian lessons, and view an Italian film festival. But they will find no traditional ads. So subtle is the mix of product and promotion that visitors hardly know an advertising message has been delivered. SEGA of America, maker of computer games and hardware, uses its Web site for a variety of different promotions, such as introducing new game characters to the public and supplying Web surfers the opportunity to down load games. Sega' s home page averages 250,000 visitors a day. To heighten interest in the site, SEGA bought an advertising banner on Netscape, thereby increasing site visits by 15 percent. Online participants in Quaker Oats' Gatorade promotion received a free T-shirt in exchange for answering a few questions. Quaker Oats reports that the online promotion created product loyalty and helped the company know its customers better. Now, to target specific Internet users, an increasing number of companies are using "push" technology which automatically delivers customized (按客户要求制造的) news and other information to users' computers when they log onto the Internet. Although organizations like Nielsen Media Research are developing technologies to enhance audience measurement and tracking, it remains difficult to assess how many times the same person looks at an ad and who that person is. Although online promotions can be glamorous and sophisticated, they are not perfect. For a well-designed marketing mix, industry experts advise companies to use the Internet as a supplement to other advertising media. |