ABSTRACT
The application of information technology (IT) facilitates changes in the marketing function and supports the execution of marketing activities. Because of the change of focus of marketing brought about by changes in the market and different competitive relationships, but also by the application of IT, the pressure to apply IT within marketing has increased. Initially, IT was only used to support marketing activities (efficiency), but soon it was used to adapt these activities, such as market research and market communication. Finally, it led to more knowledge and insight into buying processes and customers. It is this that prompted a shift in the focus of marketing towards individual identified relationships, and made it possible to do this efficiently. IT was no longer aimed at the efficient execution of activities but at pro-active approaches to customers. Knowledge of the market increasingly became ‘a bundling of knowledge of individual customers'.
