• by January 12, 2001

As you may remember, in October of last year, Volvo showed great confidence in web marketing by launching - with much fanfare - its new S60 sedan exclusively online.

Now that the results are in, the fanfare is not as audible. As it turns out, the car maker has sold less than 3,000 of the vehicles since then. And even though Phil Bienert, Volvo's manager of e-business, does not see the campaign as a failure - nearly one million people visited the special revolvolution.com website, and stayed an average of nine minutes - Volvo says there's little chance they'll use the same Internet-only strategy again, according to a report in "The Wall Street Journal."

"There is still a need to reach people through traditional media," said Bob Austin, Volvo's director of marketing communications.

According to the article, several Volvo dealers agreed with the above sentiment. "People weren't aware that we have a new car," one Palo Alto dealer told the Journal. "We found it did not drive floor traffic the way normal launches do. I would prefer the rounded media launch."

Another dealer in West Palm Beach, Fla., said the launch was "not well received" and "didn't work as well as it should have." Calling himself a traditionalist, he added, "Television is a much better way to launch a new product."

Television or not, the skeptics were right. The web, grand as it is, doesn't yet have the market penetration to stand on its own, no matter what you hear. The most successful campaigns surround their target audience, and take advantage of each medium's unique benefits.