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Title:
Net Worth
Review:
Net Worth is a follow-up title to Net Gain: Expanding
markets through Virtual Communities. The emphasis of this particular title is on
ways in which the customer or buyer of products over the Internet is going to be
able to exert considerable control over the organisations attempting to sell
products to them. Both this title and the previous one concentrate on the
potential to build new business models using virtual communities, rather than
simply attempting to do the same thing faster and cheaper. Consequently the
title will be of considerable interest to large corporations who are, or wish to
become, involved with Internet commerce. At first glance, it appears to have
less immediate relevance to information professionals, but it is not difficult
to extrapolate the authors arguments into a model relating to the provision of
information.
The authors postulate that we will shortly see the rise of
what they call 'infomediaries' which can best be described as super-intelligent
agents. These infomediaries will be able to monitor the browsing and buying
patterns of users, building up information on their interests and purchases.
They will then be in a position to inform their users about new products, find
cheaper prices for them and alert them to new products that will be of interest
to them. None of this is new of course, since shopping intelligent agents
already exist, but the authors claim that infomediaries will be able to do much
more. They will act on behalf of the consumers, rather than the sellers and as a
result we will see a very different marketing model evolving. Infomediaries will
(with permission from the consumers) be able to pass on information to the
sellers for discounts on behalf of the consumers. Furthermore, sellers will be
able to use this data to provide more targeted information to individuals who
will be particularly interested in their products, resulting in reduced costs as
advertising can be properly addressed to interested individuals and groups.
The book is easy to read and the authors use lots of
examples of the ways in which marketing will work in the future. It is in three
parts: 'The new infomediaries', 'Entry strategies' and 'The infomediation of
markets'. Useful graphics enhance the value of the text and the index is
extensive. I did however feel a certain level of frustration when reading the
book, since the authors are talking about a concept which simply doesn't exist
at the moment; they have laid out their theories clearly and drawn certain
conclusions from them, but at the moment it is difficult to see if they will be
proved correct, or are being wildly inaccurate.
However in summary I enjoyed reading Net Worth, and I would
recommend it to anyone who has a particular interest in considering the various
ways in which the Internet (and E-commerce in particular) is possibly going to
be evolving in the future. It will certainly be worth re-reading in about 18
months to see how many of the developments mentioned by the authors have come to
pass!
Free Pint Reviewer:
Phil Bradley is a well known trainer and speaker on matters
related to electronic publishing and the Internet. He travels widely to speak on
different aspects of the Internet and is the author of several books and columns
which cover this area. Phil is an independent Internet Consultant who runs
in-company training courses, writes and maintains websites for a number of
clients and can assist organisations in making the most of the Internet. You can
find out more about him, and read articles written by him at his website at
http://www.philb.com
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