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As quality management has become increasingly important, linking quality management efforts to customer wants and needs has also expanded. For consumer product manufacturers this has resulted in a need to develop more direct links to the customer. Anecdotal reports indicate that firms are beginning to tap into Internet discussions as a source for this type of information. For this exploratory study, the entire network of usenet groups was monitored for 1 year for messages containing the name of one company. The messages were analyzed and a detailed description of this type of information is provided to evaluate its potential for use in this manner and to provide the basis for research questions that may guide further efforts in theory development.

The importance of understanding the needs of the customer is a widely-accepted pre-requisite to providing quality products and services. For product purchases through traditional channels, customers are known to have expectations for the product they are buying as well as for the services associated with its purchase. Online transactions, in which the buyer has no prior knowledge of the seller, are becoming increasingly common and are fraught with risks not present in traditional channels. Feedback about sellers in these risky markets contains a mix of product-related and service-related comments. This exploratory study identifies preliminary relationships between customers' emphases on product or service dimensions of quality in their feedback and the risks to which the customer is exposed. #

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