Relationship Marketing in Consumer Markets- an Article Review

Throughout The Marketing Era the tables have turned from producers to consumers, which changed the market with alluring choices. This was when businesses began to develop brands, to differentiate themselves from their competitors, helping their customers identify various unique products. Last but least The Relationship Era is where businesses aim to build long-term relationships, because they believe a satisfied customer can become great assets for a business. A satisfied customer is a loyal and businesses rely on customers to spread the word on their goods and services.

Why is partnering described as the highest-quality selling relationship? Why has the building of partnerships become more important today?

The fundamental principle upon which relationship marketing is founded is that the greater the level of customer satisfaction with the relationship – not just the product or service – then the greater the likelihood that the customer will stay with us. The importance of retaining customers is that there is strong evidence that customer retention and

7) The significance of the shift from transaction-based marketing to relationship marketing is that firms realize that just attracting customers to buy their products is not quite as important as establishing and maintaining relationships with them so that they will turn into loyal repeat customers. Relationship building begins early in marketing. It starts with what customers want and need, and then developing high-quality products to meet those needs.

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

Development of good customer relations is vital for the survival of any given company. Marketing research serves as an indicator of the level of current costumer relation,

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

I will be analyzing our relationship using Mark Knapp’s model of relationship development, the transactional model of

1 In Relationship era, business gets a different method which includes long time relation with their customers and how they buy that products by just knowing about their customer’s desires and needs. They interact with their customers and it takes a lot of time to know about each person personally. The companies who have long term customers, they don’t have to give discounts to make new customers because their regular customers help them by just referring that product or company. The companies get a lot of benefits from their existing customers as the relationships between the customers reduce their overall costs. During this era, business did not confine to one nation only but it grows beyond boundaries.

The relationship strategy is a fundamental alliance of both the parties, (customer & sales person). Sales & Marketing person plays a significant role to generate revenue for the company. Despite being some deficiencies in the product or if the market condition is not appropriate, sales person always comes as a problem solver to the enterprise and the customer. In the hospitality sector, day to day loss cannot be recovered in future. Example: if

Relationship marketing is very different compared to transactional marketing. Essentially, transactional marketing focuses on getting the customer to buy a certain product and walk away, whilst relationship marketing sees the sale as the first step in the building of a relationship (which is what apple thrives to do).

| 1. Built relationship powered by principle of honesty, trust & engagement with employers as well as with customers.(1) 2. Partnership experience relative,consistant & rewarding(1) 3.

According Baker M (2000), loyalty schemes is the “Overt attempt of exchanging partnership to build a long term relationship association, characterised by purposeful co-operation and mutual dependence on the development of social, as well as structural bonds with consumer”.

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

Purpose - In a seminal article, Webster argued in 1992 (Journal of Marketing, Vol. 56/October, pp. 1-17) that some changes in concept and practice have fundamentally reshaped the field of marketing. He claims that ‘customer relationships' are now the key strategic resource of a business. Strategic partnerships and networks are replacing simple market-based transactions. The purpose of this paper is to investigate this claim in the context of various relationships maintained by the adidas® group.