[November 21, 2009] PROFILE: NMSU prof studies how the Internet has changed marketing and advertising Tweet LAS CRUCES, Nov 21, 2009 (Las Cruces Sun-News - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Bruce Huhmann knows it is a very dynamic time to be studying marketing and advertising. The Internet has changed all the rules. "We are in the midst of a big shift, but eventually there will be another side where the Internet will become established and the ground rules will be set," said Huhmann, 42, an associate professor at New Mexico State University's Department of Marketing. He compares the Internet age to the dawn of automobiles. The Internet infancy, mostly the 1990s, has passed, but there is still plenty of growth on the way. "We're at the stage of Henry Ford and of building other businesses on top of the Internet," Huhmann said. "Much like there were drive-thrus and drive-ins and innovations with the automobile." He pointed to social Web sites and services like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter that continue to change how the Internet is utilized. "But we'll reach a state where the Internet is established," he said. "There'll be something else that will be the new disruptive force and attention." Despite the fast pace of change, Huhmann said rumors of the death of advertising are greatly exaggerated. "Advertising is really just letting people know about products, and there is a persuasive aspect, of course," he said. "People who say that advertising is dead are wrong." Still, the old modes and ways have been supplanted. "Advertising is in a huge transition," he said. "For a long time the technology was all set. (Ads) had been established for a long time and all the ground rules were set down. Now there's the Internet and it's really introduced a whole new set of ad placement opportunities." Companies have to deal with a public that receives its information across a wide spectrum of outlets. "I know students in my class who've said they don't have a television; they watch what they want to watch by looking at it online," Huhmann said. "You'll see content providers finding a way to straddle (technology); it's a really iffy time until things settle down and we learn the new rules." Huhmann is a native of Kansas City, Mo. He earned a degree in business administration from Rockhurst University in Kansas City and then picked up a master's degree and a doctorate in marketing at the University of Alabama. His first job was in Canada at the University of Manitoba before he came to Las Cruces in 2002. Huhmann said he and his wife, Mary, have a 10-year-old daughter, Penelope, and a 5-year-old son, Alban. "We like to go to Coas (bookstore) for story time, my children love books," he said. "We also like to go to parks, we go to White Sands." Brook Stockberger can be reached at [email protected]; (575) 541-5457 To see more of the Las Cruces Sun-News, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.lcsun-news.com. Copyright (c) 2009, Las Cruces Sun-News, N.M. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email [email protected], call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]