Web 2.0 as a marketing tool: an investigation in the furniture industry

The steady increase in web 2.0 adoption rate by internet users has conveyed a great deal of attention of marketing practitioners and scholars on the opportunities presented by active and participant consumers. While marketing literature has focused on the potential of these instruments as marketing tools to be implemented by firms, few investigations have shed light on the actual adoption of social media and web 2.0 tools and services among firms in specific industries. The paper presents the results of an analysis of the diffusion of web 2.0 services and technologies among a sample of firms in the furniture industry, as to assess the maturity – or lack thereof – of adoption models as well as the ways in which these instruments are used by small and medium-sized firms