Researching the social Web: marketing information from virtual communities

This paper argues that, by focusing on the use of the Internet for one‐to‐one communications, marketers are in danger of ignoring the many‐to‐many communications that are taking place as consumers interact with one another. The authors explore the increasing proliferation of Internet discussion groups and chat rooms that are often market‐orientated in their focus and discuss how the study of virtual communities can provide rich insights for marketers. Detailing how ethnographic research methods can assist the understanding of such online environments, they consider the theoretical and methodological differences between offline and online ethnographic research.