Comparison of Website Usage of French and Italian Luxury Brands

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper develops a profile of the Internet presence of French and Italian Luxury brands. France and Italy are the most important luxury brand source countries. Their luxury brands extend over more product lines and a broader range of product categories than those of any other country. This is the first study to examine how luxury brands use the Internet, and thus is largely exploratory. A survey of 86 luxury brand websites carried out for this study provides the data to create a profile and comparative analysis of these two primary source countries of luxury brands. The key research objective is to use common terminology and measures to understand how French and Italian brands use the Internet and whether there are differences in website characteristics. Of particular interest is to determine the extent to which websites serve as alternate marketing channels. Thus, marketing managers of French and Italian luxury brands are offered a perspective on the growing importance of the Internet and how...