E-Commerce and Application Service Providers in the Promotional Products Industry

Abstract

Whether we want to face it or not, the Internet will play a major role in the future of our industry. The nature of the supplier, distributor, and customer relationship is changing rapidly due to the emergence of the New Economy spurred by rapid technological development. Connections and information are no longer scarce resources. Service becomes the key as a new type of middleman evolves-infomediaries whose ability to provide useful and timely information will become a core competency for the 21st century in the same way manufacturing was in the 20th. This “Network Effect” is in turn causing the rapid emergence of a completely new type of Internet business-the application service provider. The ASP model not only provides the promotional products industry with the software to allow customers to buy from a particular web location, it also supplies a stream of information both into and out of each affiliate's site.