The rapid development of new interactive media such as on-line services and the World Wide Web was supposed to take both consumers and marketers by surprise. In this fast developing stage it was difficult to estimate its likely impact on consumer behaviour. As of today, our experience has not lived up to the enthusiastic foresights in the public discourse. It is to be recognised that within the marketing discipline this is a fairly new field of study and the existing literature is quite scattered and so far does not present any constructive theories or models. We will attempt to examine the relation between new technologies, consumers and marketers within the framework of traditional methods of marketing. We will study their expectations and attitudes toward this marketing tool to increase efficiency and competitiveness. Further, we will study how companies can use Internet for possible creations of homogenous and global market segmentation for their products and services. How can increased use of Internet change the role of the middleman (e.g. retailers and distributors)? Most companies can not use the Internet to serve all of these functions, but instead are evaluating which functions can be performed by this new medium more effectively than existing alternatives. Every business must determine what combination of Internet technologies and traditional marketing methods are appropriate for it self.

Jean Claude Usunier & Julie Anne Lee. Marketing Across Cultures. 5th edition. Prentice Hall.
Articles: Available through the CBS library
Cases: Most articles can be bought from the bookstore: “Samfundslitteratur”and some can be found in different databases. A few can be found on Sitescape as pdf. files.