Thinking Behind Customer Relationships

...

a brand position with nonusers to help users make a statement about their own image.

Characteristics of a Genuine Business Relationship

• Mutual

• Interactive

• Iterative

• Providing ongoing benefit to both parties

• Requires a change in behavior for both parties

• Unique

• Requires-and produces-trust

First, a relationship implies mutuality. In order for any “state of affairs” to be considered a relationship, both parties have to participate in and be aware of the existence of the relationship.

A customer can have a great deal of affection for a brand all by herself but, by definition, a relationship between the customer and the brand can only be said to exist if the brand (i.e., the enterprise behind the brand) is also aware of the individual customer’s existence, creating a neodefinition of an interesting new twist for the term brand awareness.

Second, relationships are driven by interaction. When two parties interact, they exchange information, and this information exchange is a central engine for building on the relationship. This, of course, also implies mutuality.

Third, iterative- interactions between two parties build up a history, over time—a context. The more you communicate with one person, the less you need to stay the next time around to get your point across. One practical implication of the iterative nature of a customer relationship is that it generates a convenience benefit to the customer for continuing the relationship.

For example- Amazon.com remembers your book preferences, your address, and your credit card number, based on your previous interactions with it. To purchase your next book from Amazon.com, you need only find the book and click on it. If you’ve bought enough books already at Amazon.com, you might not even need to find the next one—it can do a pretty good job of finding it for you. The richer the context of any customer relationship, the more difficult it will be for the customer to re-create it elsewhere, and so the more loyal the customer is likely to be.

Forth, Ongoing benefits between both parties. The customer’s convenience is one type of benefit, for the customer, but not the only one. Participating in a relationship will involve a cost in money, time, or effort, and no customer will engage for long in any relationship if there is not enough continuing benefit to offset this cost.

Fifth, change in behavior on the part of both parties— the enterprise as well as the customer—in order to continue. After all, what drives the ongoing benefit of a relationship is not only its context—its history of interactions, developed over time—but also the fact that each party’s current and future actions appropriately reflect that historical context. Companies sometimes mistakenly believe that interactions with a customer need only involve routine, outbound communications, delivered the same way to every customer. But all the customers’ needs are not similar. If the company cannot identify those differences then customer might not elect to continue the relationship.

Fifth, uniqueness- every relationship is different. Relationships are constituted with individuals, not with populations. As a result, an enterprise that seeks to engage its customers in relationships must be prepared to participate in different interactions, remember different histories, and engage in different behaviors toward different customers.

Finally, trust-If a customer develops a relationship with an enterprise, the customer tends more and more to trust the enterprise to act in the customer’s own interest. Trust and affection and satisfaction are all related feelings on the part of a customer toward a company. They constitute emotional elements of a relationship; but for an enterprise to acknowledge and use these elements profitably with the requirement of generating and sustaining the trust of a customer.