But they grew at faster than a 1,000 percent rate in 1995. The number of commercial websites grew 62 percent during the first quarter of 1996 alone, and Internet traffic overall is exploding at 85 percent per year. Not all is rosy, he cautioned. Customers must initiate contact, and product differentiation becomes more difficult in virtual markets. Low entry barriers allow competitors to quickly develop an electronic presence where buyers can find them easily.
Competitors monitoring business sites immediately know what rivals are up to.
And potential security issues still bedevil what many consider to still be a very experimental medium without proven business models. Database Marketing Powerhouse. She enthusiastically recommended what she calls the 'spider marketing' approach to building, analyzing, and acting upon customer information collected online. Then you can capitalize on who's visiting your site, develop selling opportunities, and create oneonone connections with customers. The desktop computing revolution has since empowered individual endusers, changing patterns of business decision making, setting the stage for Internet growth beyond its government and academic origins, and fueling a 76 percent annual growth rate expected through the year 2000.