ABSTRACT
As we discussed in Part 1, marketing only became involved with information technology (IT) quite late; the large-scale application of IT did not take place until the 1990s. Initially it was associated with data processing and the management of vast quantities of information. The first automation companies (in the 1960s and 1970s) worked on this data processing using mainframes (IBM was market leader). The first applications of IT in marketing also involved data processing and were used by market research companies in the 1970s. It was only when IT was database driven and focused on the provision of information that it also began to be applied within marketing increasingly often (mid 1980s). Then when the focus in marketing shifted from bringing products to the market to building and maintaining relationships, a process developed that was mutually influential. The development of automation, however, originally began in the 1930s with mechanization. This formed the basis of the marketing function.
