The Business and Technology Journal of PC Tech Magazine
April 29, 2011
April 29, 2011
The Internet has changed how consumers buy and organisations market in today’s economy. The promise of the Internet in marketing function of organisations is seen as direct dialogue with customers and enhancing opportunities for branding initiatives, product customisation, and relationship building with customers. As it becomes increasing important for organisations to extend their reach to more customers through the Internet there is also the complex difficulty of being dynamically responsive to the changing needs and preferences of customers in this new medium of marketing. Identifying and understanding the needs of customers does become necessary. Hence, it is becoming an increasing norm for organisations to achieve this objective of understanding customers and their needs by forming or building a community of its customers or potential customers online. An online community is defined as set of interwoven relationships built upon the foundation of shared interests.
These shared interests can refer to a diversity of topics, activities, or commonalities which bring people together online. These communities have proved to have contributed to success of online firms Facebook.com, and Amazon.com. Whiles some organisations have extended their online and offline presence through online communities, other organisations have originated as online community focused on a shared interest like eBay, thus without the Internet or an equivalent communication medium these organisations may not exist. In both instances, there is objective need for the underpinning organisation or administrator of the community to understand its members or potential members in order to create value for the community.
