The commercial explosion of the Internet is, in many ways, analogous to the start of a large footrace. Initially, when the gun goes off and throngs of people charge down the pavement, it is difficult to distinguish the competitive racers from the inexperienced enthusiasts. Soon, however, the excitement wears off as fatigue sets in and the pacesetters pull away from the pack, their legs fueled by years of preparation and hard work.

The purpose of this book is to provide the Internet business community with comprehensive information about understanding, using, acquiring, and conducting market and marketing research online. For many years, market and marketing research have been standard tools used in traditional industries to take much of the guesswork out of making critical business decisions. Without research, companies are, quite frankly, conducting their business like a game of "pin the tail on the donkey."

The advent of the Web has caused a revolution in the research community. Web technology has astronomically reduced the cost of conducting numerous types of research and simultaneously enabled the execution of more complicated and rigorous study designs. Businesses that operate entirely online, or have significant online components to their sales or marketing strategies, have a fantastic opportunity to reap the benefits of this revolution.

Unfortunately, Web companies are still stumbling around in the dark, because they lack the unique combination of research and technology skills to leverage these new opportunities...