An Ethical Basis for Relationship Marketing- a Virtue Ethics Perspective

Given such a turbulent business environment, building relationships with important stakeholders is crucial to a firm’s well-being. Both customers and employees are major concerns for firms that want to develop loyalty and competitive advantages. The challenge for long-run success in business is to continually increase the customer’s dependence on the company to provide products in an environment of mutual respect and perceived fairness. Creating mutually beneficial exchange relationship with customers mean that both parties work together to understand needs and develop trust.

Ferrell, O.C., Fraedrich, J., & Ferrell, L. (2015). Business ethics: Ethical decision making and cases (10th ed.). Mason, OH: Cengage.

The purchasing goods & services have throughout the years begun to lead to a new perception of consumer relationship and in ways businesses conduct their operations. Not only is a business concerned with the buying and selling of goods & services but to further maintain that relationship with their customers to correlate between both parties. As this being the prime functionality of businesses, each business must differentiate themselves with other businesses offering different and wholesome services, which overwhelms their competitors, thus adding their own individualistic value to the marketing

3.) Transactional marketing, in the perspective of luring the customer for a one off purchase, focuses strongly on price and short term benefits and product performance, with limited service. Relationship marketing is all about generating repeated sales and customer interactions, thus focusing on bringing value to the customer, and assuring long term performance and service, all aspects of quality become major concerns. Relationship marketing brings customer centricity to the spotlight. This vision has

Shaw, William H., and Vincent E. Barry. Moral issues in business. 12th ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2013. Print.

Ethics is generally defined as “the standard of behavior by which conduct is judged”. In other words, individuals execute actions in different ways based on their ethical beliefs which are obtained by their personal moral principles. While we usually associate this notion to people, it can also be used for businesses. The latter can judged by potential customers, other firms, and many other different actors. Marketing plays an essential role in communicating and building judgements regarding a particular company. It generally showcases a company’s beliefs and values. It upholds them to their social responsibilities.

Ferrell, O. C., Fraedrich, J., & Ferrell, L. (2013). Business ethics: Ethical decision making and cases [9th edition]. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning. Retrieved from

Linda Klebe Trenno & Katherine, A. Nelson, Managing Business Ethics: Straight Talk About How to Do It Right, 2nd. Ed., John Wiley & Sons، New York, 1999.

Introduction: Ethics is the principle of differentiating between right and wrong. In business and marketing process, a number of ethical issues are involved that may have a positive or negative impact on the company. The term Ethical marketing is not only a marketing strategy but also a philosophy. It encourages a company representative to be honest, fair, and responsible in all advertising. It also includes communication skill, leadership skill, teamwork and strong interpersonal skill which keeps a man away from any illegal or bad things.

To help to maintain a constant appropriate standard of ethical marketing within America and worldwide; the American Marketing Association

5. RELATIONSHIP MARKETING: In this competitive era, companies are always looking for ways to develop and maintain a long lasting relationship with customers, employees and even suppliers. Relationship marketing is two way traffic; it goes beyond just making ‘sales’ and companies are beginning to realize. Good relationship with customers is a strategic weapon for any company, this is because long term customers buy more, do referrals and give back valuable and truthful feedback. Keeping a customer requires an extra effort. According to the founder of Walmart: “There is only one boss, the customer, and he can fire

ABSTRACT: In order to be consumer-oriented, marketing will have to be truthful and ethical. That is why it is very important in marketing, as in any other field; to apply the principles of Ethics It is also important to apply the processes of innovation, to find new ways of marketing effectively. This Paper explains the concept of Ethics in Marketing and overview a number of issues around innovation:

The goals of relationship marketing is to create strong, even emotional, customer connections to s brand that can lead to ongoing business, free word-of-mouth promotion and information from customers that can generate leads.

Marketing today is very different to how it used to be. Effective marketing is all about understanding the external market and identifying that the customers are looking for something unique rather than what is already available. There are two approaches that an organisation can take when marketing a product to the consumer. These are transactional marketing and entrepreneurial or relationship marketing. Relationship marketing is a more modern approach to marketing today, as it is a way of gaining repeat sales and a close relationship to the customer. Relationship marketing is defined as an “attempts to involve an integrate customers, suppliers and other infrastructural partners into a firm’s developmental and marketing activities.” (Sehr 1994). When the producers communicate directly with their consumer individually they are more likely to develop a close relationship, which will hopefully result in frequent sales. (Sehr 1994) The producer’s main priority is on the needs and wants of the consumer and ensuring that they are given the most efficient service. There opinion is what matters to them creating a two-way system for a long-term sustainable performance. Transactional marketing, adopted by sim venture, is the other marketing strategy that can be taken by an organisation. This is a more old fashioned view of marketing and considered to be a one-way system. Limited contact is made between the

Relationship marketing “transcends the actual product or service to create stronger bonds with consumers and maximize brand resonance” (Strategic Brand Management, P. 182). This marketing strategy understands that customers are the key to success. They treated customers with utmost care. As I mentioned in my personal experience above, Apple created a sense of connection