He believes that marketing informed by an understanding of online behaviour is the route to turning e-business into profitable business. Internet consumers are not one big bunch. At first they were, but now they're not, and the key to success now is to apply rigorous marketing disciplines. Online behaviour is difficult to predict. European users of online services appear to be very sensitive to certain negative experiences, yet also very persistent in some circumstances.
Online business is highly service-oriented.
There is a consensus that getting service right is going to be key to long-term success in online business. What they want, usually, is service. But whatever the underlying cause, in businesses with an intense focus on service, companies can only expect to compete effectively on the basis of a fairly comprehensive understanding of consumers' motivations. One typical approach refined by Forrester Research, called technographics, analyses the potential consumer in three ways, and then combines the results to derive a series of consumer types or predispositions. Most online activity, like any activity, is driven by a complex mix of motivations.