Emerging High-Tech Consumer

Who are the consumers of high-tech goods and services, and what will their needs and preferences be as we move into the next century? Allan Reddy and his team of marketing researchers and professionals lay out the essentials of a high-tech consumer profile, then dig into the implications this holds for developing successful marketing strategies. They synthesize the important current research and its findings, and by taking a multi-specialist approach to their subject, they bring a variety of interlocking and essential viewpoints to bear on it. A must read for professional marketers and their academic colleagues, and a useful overview for high-tech industry strategists and planners.

Reddy divides the book into eleven chapters and three appendices. Essays introduce the major ideas about the high-tech consumer and look at this consumer in business-to-business marketing. Other chapters look at the Telecommunications Act, the Internet, the importance of quality in high-tech goods, the measurement of high-tech innovators, the global consumer, and distribution considerations. The last chapter presents conclusions and implications for marketers, while the appendices look at research techniques, Internet marketing, and just-in-time retailing. The book has substantive references and author and subject indexes.

ALLAN C. REDDY is Professor of Marketing at the College of Business Administration, Valdosta State University, with special interest and expertise in the study of economic growth. He is the author of numerous journal articles and three previous Quorum books: A Macro Perspective on Technology Transfer (1996), Total Quality Marketing: The Key to Regaining Market Shares (1994), and Marketing's Role in Economic Development (with David Campbell, 1993).