A poll by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) questioned businesses and shoppers about their attitudes towards the World Wide Web and the impact it has made.

Consumers believe it's made businesses more accountable and given the shopper more power, with people increasingly looking at comments from their peers before deciding where to buy.

The survey, jointly carried out with search engine giant Google, found that 75% of businesses plan to make their online presence more central to their overall business, while more than half plan to invest more in online marketing.

But seven out of ten said they still had a lot to learn about what the Internet could do for them.

The CBI's Richard Lambert said:

"Businesses have already come a long way on the Internet journey. If there were such a thing as a digital base camp, they would have reached it. But their real ascent is still ahead of them, and much of the terrain is unknown."