Hewlett-Packard Co says it will this week become one of the biggest spenders on web advertising in Europe, as part of a concerted effort to attract small and medium size enterprise customers to its Commerce Center online procurement services. The Grenoble, France-based PC marketing arm of the Palo Alto computer company says it will become the biggest IT equipment advertiser on the French, German and UK web sites of Yahoo! and ZDNet, and plans to launch a similar advertising assault on the Excite European web site shortly afterwards.
Frederic Leenhardt, HP’s European business PC marketing manager, said the web-based strategy will make it quicker and easier for SME’s to buy HP equipment, bringing the company’s sales channel more in line with rival services from Dell and Gateway. However, the company will continue to fulfill online orders via its established network of local resellers and distributors in Europe’s three major PC markets. This means that HP customers will be able to check the real delivery of status or products online before purchasing, and should expect to see orders fulfilled within 48 hours.
The lower cost of sale possible via the web will also been passed on to customers who, said Leenhardt, will see aggressive pricing from the company as it fights to claw back market share from IBM, Fujitsu and Compaq.
