Is Internet a Friend or a foe of traditional marketers?

With the recent technological advances in Internet and Internet marketing, there is an uncomfortable feeling both among marketers and marketing academicians if Internet marketing would eventually replace traditional channel and retail-outlet based marketing. In this connection this article examines and compares the essential marketing efficiencies of Internet marketing (IM) and traditional marketing (TM). Invoking the functional approach to marketing, the focus of discussion is to what extent IM fulfills the essential function of marketing, that is, to obtain and service demand, compared to TM. Specific functional services investigated include the efficiencies of information-dissemination, distribution, total-shopping experience, and their cost effectiveness. Given this methodology and theoretical focus, the paper first discusses functional areas that IM clearly surpasses TM; then examines features where TM does better than IM, and finally, explores opportunities whereby IM can do even better to surpass TM. Given this, some implications for marketers and marketing academicians are outlined.