As the Internet becomes ubiquitous in business life, early fears that it would disrupt the business models of many companies (for example, by enabling customers to switch suppliers easily) have subsided. According to a February 2002 study, many now see the Internet as a significant opportunity — specifically, a chance to reduce customer-service costs, tighten customer relationships, personalize marketing messages and enable “mass customization.” The paper is “Customer Relationships Go Digital,” by George S. Day, the Geoffrey T. Boisi Professor and a professor of marketing at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, and Katrina J. Hubbard, a doctoral candidate in the marketing department at Pennsylvania State University.The study is a survey of 352 senior marketing and sales (and several management-information system) managers on the Internet's impact on their ability to manage customer relationships. Respondents came from a wide range of industries, including manufacturing, transportation, public utilities, wholesale and retail trade, finance, insurance and real estate. Businesses were located in all 50 states, and all had more than 500 employees. Just over half were business-to-business, roughly a quarter were business-to-consumer and a quarter sold to both markets.U
