Strangely, and despite the proliferation over the years of books on every conceivable aspect of marketing, there has been very little published on one of the most practical and profitable of all management tools – the marketing audit. While many texts contain check lists and ‘best practice’ guidelines, to my knowledge there have been no books, other than this one and its earlier manifestations, which are devoted solely to marketing. Marketing has never experienced such turbulence and rapidity of change as is occurring now. The emergence of new media and techniques, most particularly electronic marketing, the relaxation of regulations which governed the content and targeting of promotional message, and the realities of the global market all challenge conventional and established marketing methods. As a result, checklists compiled in the last decade of the 20th century have been substantially overtaken and have important omissions. This is particularly true in information-gathering and management and, of course, the various aspects of electronic marketing. The huge mass of information now available via the Internet is increasing geometrically every year. It has virtually eliminated most of the painstaking, time-consuming activities involved in locating information sources and accessing their contents. Similarly, although the jury is still out on the effectiveness of some forms of electronic advertising, it is nevertheless a new and important medium. Away from electronic communications and logistics there have been important developments in relationship and affinity marketing, competitive intelligence and distribution logistics, to name just four areas. These changes require different approaches in their assessment and thus there are new questions to be asked. Consequently, this book, while retaining the core of previous editions published under the title Marketing Audit Check Lists, is a new work which makes the previous editions obsolete.