LIVONIA, MICHIGAN, U.S.A., 1996 JAN 22 (NB) -- Some business-to- business marketers are both enthusiastic and uneasy about using the Internet as a marketing tool, a new survey from Brewer Associates Marketing Communications shows.
In a survey of southeastern Michigan business marketers, 43 percent said they were "apprehensive" about Internet marketing, yet 34 percent were "enthusiastic." What's more, one third of those surveyed said they are already using the Internet for marketing, and 77 percent expect to include the worldwide network of computers in their marketing mix within the next five years. Only seven percent said they'd never use the Internet for marketing.
The Brewer Associates study surveyed more than 100 business people who were mainly from the Detroit area in November, 1995. While the results were local in nature, John Ojala, president of Brewer Associates, told Newsbytes the survey could be indicative of the business-to-business marketplace in general. "In some of the surveys we've seen from other companies of business-to-business marketers, those figures seem to match ours," he said. "So I'd say this is a fair cross-section of business-to-business people and companies."
Ojala said about 25 percent of the surveys returned to his company came from as far away as Cincinnati and Chicago, so the results might have more of a "regional" flavor.
Marketing via the Internet has benefits in accessing information, said 74 percent of the survey respondents. Sixty-seven percent said the Internet led to faster communication among companies, and 60 percent saw Internet marketing as a way to identify their companies as being "progressive."
The survey did point out some disadvantages business-to-business marketers saw in using the Internet. Fifty-three percent see a lack of security and confidentiality, 48 percent saw confusion among users, and constantly-changing technology was cited by 44 percent as being a disadvantage.
When asked how marketers would prefer to implement an Internet marketing program, 45 percent favored using an Internet specialist, while 24 percent planned on doing it themselves. Eighteen percent would work with marketing communications or advertising agencies.
"There doesn't appear to be much confidence right now that traditional agencies can provide Internet services, and it may be that people think it's too technically challenging. We don't think that's true," Ojala said.
(Bob Woods/19960122/Press Contact: John Ojala, Brewer Associates Marketing Communications, 313-458-7180)
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