In a period from 1994-2000 the Internet has excited the nation and the world like no technology had done before. Consider this, in 1992, there were 50 Web sites in the world. The numbers have changed dramatically over one decade. The total number of domains registered world wide show this increase very vividly.* Note the decline in total registered and .COM domain names from 2001 to 2002.

Also note the increase from 2002 to today (1/13/2009) in the number of active .com and total active domains as shown in the following tables. The change in the numbers is quite informative as they show a significant upward trend.

The meteoric rise in the Internet’s popularity and the promise of fortunes resulted in a “dot-com” rush, high speculations, astronomical stock prices, many millionaires, and more Porsche’s on the road. Probably more people learned such terms like IPO, stock options, and venture capital because of the constant reporting of the new companies and their promise of fortunes in the media. Now that most of those “dot-com”s have become “not-com”s, more Porsche’s have been auctioned off, afternoon massage sessions are fond memories for some, we need to regroup and try to understand what went wrong. No doubt that:

• Marketing is heavily intertwined with communication at many levels
• The extraordinary growth of e-commerce and the failure of many requires a new look at the marketing approaches suitable for the Internet
• The Internet offers many opportunities in very efficient customer support and customer service, how do we tap into this resource?
• Marketing on the Internet offers opportunities and efficiencies in many aspects of marketing and synergies between brick-and-mortar retailing and e-tailing has become more apparent then before. (The previous sentence has been a part of my syllabus for several years now and it sounds more plausible now than it did before.) How do we capitalize on the synergies between the real and the virtual worlds?

Description and objectives

This course will offer an opportunity to explore the impact of information technology on the practice of marketing. Although marketing on the Internet will be the main focus, the course will investigate technology issues that may go beyond it. Students will learn the dimensions of the Internet, its capabilities and limitations, the basics of the communications technology that drive the Internet. A significant component of this course will require learning how to design a reasonably complex Web site for marketing purposes. You will spend much time on and off your computer designing your Web site, creating content for it, and implementing your design ideas in the final product with a marketing purpose. Students should aim to achieve the following by the end of the semester:

• Discover the uses of the Internet for marketing
• Learn how the Internet works and how this technology may affect marketing
• Learn to use the common client side tools of the Internet efficiently and effectively: e-mail, Web browsing and FTP
• Learn general HTML structure and CSS use
• Create marketing oriented Web sites using a content management system (CMS)

Equipped with the foundation knowledge, the class will look at marketing in this new framework and utilize their knowledge of marketing and the communications technology to practice marketing on the Internet. At the end of this semester you will have obtained a valuable skill, creating Web sites, and a context for that skill, marketing. You will find this combination quite helpful when having job interviews.

* “Latest Domain Stats”, http://www.domainstats.com/, 2 August 2002.

Note: As of 1 August 2003, the above numbers were 33,282,713 and 23,841,755 (Detailed Domain Counts and Internet Statistic, http://www.whois.sc/internet-statistics/) As of 22 December 2006, the above numbers were 81,627,641 and 60,667,069 (Domain Counts & Internet Statistics, http://www.domaintools.com/internet- statistics/)