The Impact of the Internet on Marketing Strategy: Revisiting Early Predictions

This conceptual paper revisits and reviews early milestone literature of influential authors, who discuss the impact of the Internet on major forces that shape a company’s marketing strategy to assess whether their futurist predictions and conceptual claims turned out to be true or were later falsified by empirical research or market experience. In particular, the impact of the Internet on customers, design of products/services, pricing, marketing communications, intermediaries, publics, and social/cultural environment is explored. Throughout the paper, related under-researched and unsettled areas are discussed and future research avenues are suggested.