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Passage 2
In the first year or so of Web business, most of the action has revolved around efforts to tap the consumer market. More recently, as the Web proved to be more than a fashion, companies have started to buy and sell products and services with one another. Such business-to-business
sales make sense because businesspeople typically know what product they're looking for.
Nonetheless, many companies still hesitate to use the Web because of doubts about its relia- bility. "Businesses need to feel they can trust the pathway between them and the supplier, " says senior analyst Blane Erwin of Forrester Research. Some companies are limiting the risk by con-
ducting online transactions only with established business partners who are given access to the company ' s private internet .
Another major shift in the model for Internet commerce concerns the technology available for marketing. Until recently, Internet marketing activities have focused on strategies to "pull" cus- tomers into sites. In the past year, however, software companies have developed tools that allow companies to "push" information directly out to consumers , transmitting marketing messages di- rectly to targeted customers. Most notably, the Pointcast Network uses a screen saver to deliver a continualiy updated stream of news and advertisements to subscribers' computer monitors. Sub- scribers can customize the information they want to receive and proceed directly to a company ' s Web site. Companies such as Virtual Vineyards are already starting to use similar technologies to push messages to customers about special sales, product offerings, or other events. But push tech- nology has earned the contempt of many Web users. Online culture thinks highly of the notion that the information flowing onto the screen comes there by specific request. Once commercial promotion begins to fill the screen uninvited, the distinction between the Web and television fades. That's a prospect that horrifies Net purists.
But it is hardly inevitable that companies on the Web will need to resort to push strategies to make money. The examples of Virtual Vineyards, Amazon.com, and other pioneers show that a Web site selling the right kind of products with the right mix of interactivity, hospitality, and se-
curity will attract online customers. And the cost of computing power continues
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