THE EVOLUTION OF AN IDEA: AN ENVIRONMENTAL EXPLANATION OF RELATIONSHIP MARKETING
Adrian Palmer
Gloucestershire Business School
Based on forthcominmg article in Journal of Relationship Marketing
ABSTRACT
The principles and practices of relationship marketing date back many centuries, yet as a topic of academic and applied interest, it has achieved pre-eminence as a paradigm only during the past two decades. Some may dismiss relationship marketing as merely an old idea with new language. However, this paper argues that recent development of relationship marketing has been based on significant changes in the business environment of organizations. An environmental audit analysis is used to explain the recent growth of relationship marketing, and more importantly, to identify future challenges for relationship marketing as the business environment evolves.
INTRODUCTION
A search through most publications databases would reveal very few, if any, references to “relationship marketing” prior to 1980. However, since the early 1990s the number of times the term is mentioned in the title or as a keyword in articles has appeared to grow exponentially. This might seem curious as the whole notion of buyer-seller relationships, which lies at the heart of relationship marketing, can be traced back several centuries. Numerous writers and historians of Victorian England, for example have described activities which amount to modern day relationship marketing (Clegg 1956). The question then arises of the theoretical and practical underpinnings of this "new idea". Is relationship marketing merely another "big new idea" which has risen on an opportunistic wave, only to follow previous big ideas such as Total Quality Management and Management by Objectives into obscurity when critics realized that there was really nothing new? Or does the development of relationship marketing reflect fundamental shifts in the business environment, which will continue to provide a place for the concept?
One view is that when the underlying principles of relationship marketing are examined, they are quite indistinguishable from the fundamental principles of marketing. Viewed as a philosophy, relationship marketing shares with traditional definitions of marketing a concern for satisfying customers effectively and profitably. The Chartered Institute of Marketing's definition of marketing as being "The management process which identifies, anticipates and supplies customer requirements efficiently and profitably" could be equally applied to relationship marketing when applied at the level of a guiding philosophy (Berry 1995 ). By this view, relationship marketing will mature until it becomes essentially a basic of principle of marketing, and the distinguishing title of "Relationship" will become less relevant.
An alternative view is that relationship marketing emerged in the 1990s in response to changes which were occurring in the business environment. As environmental change continues, relationship marketing will evolve by fragmenting into numerous specialist interest subjects. Academics and practitioners will need to keep hold of a "big idea", which will gradually mutate. Part of this mutation may be represented by subtle changes in language which have appeared in published material and training courses, for example “customer relationship management”, "database marketing", "direct marketing" and "customer loyalty".
There have been many studies of how ideas grow to become mainstream and the critical factors involved in this process. Chaos theory and the study of mimetics has offered an explanation of how, through random events, a small local idea can develop into a global paradigm. A recent analysis by Gladwell has discussed how reaching a critical point is facilitated by the existence of “connectors”, “mavens” and the “stickiness” of an idea (Gladwell 2000). If it can be shown that relationship marketing rose in prominence as a result of the factors described by Gladwell, it may be expected that another idea developed by a “maven” may come along with similar levels of “stickiness” and promulgated by a new set of "connectors".
So is relationship marketing a passing "big idea", or a paradigm which is fundamentally rooted in its environment? The aim of this paper is to explain the rise of relationship marketing as a dominant paradigm during the 1990s. If the basic principles were not new, why did it suddenly become so popular? This paper uses an environmental audit analysis to seek an explanation. More significantly, what can a study of the marketing environment say about likely future development of relationship marketing? Is the evolution of the paradigm simply a shift in semantics or are there underlying forces in the environment which explain its growth and will continue to sustain the paradigm?
This paper is primarily concerned with the rapid development of relationship marketing in the business to consumer domain. Contemporary origins of relationship marketing are rooted in relationships between organizations, but the paradigm has subsequently been stretched to situations in which there are a few sellers and possibly millions of buyers. In such situations, the existence of power imbalances is common and consumers may not seek a relationship at an attitudinal level which is often implied by business to business models of buyer seller relationships. Nevertheless, relationship marketing has featured prominently in the marketing strategies of many consumer goods and services companies during the 1990s.
Defining Relationship Marketing
The term relationship marketing has been used generically to cover various activities, with distinction made between its philosophical, strategic and operational dimensions (Berry 1995). Gronroos (1994) provided a general definition of the domain of relationship marketing when he described it as being about mutually beneficial exchanges and fulfillment of promises by both parties in a series of interactions over the lifetime of their relationship. A number of recurrent themes have helped to define the domain of relationship marketing, especially trust, commitment, a long-term orientation and co-operation (Morgan and Hunt 1994; Bagozzi 1995; Gronroos 1994; Christopher, Payne and Ballantyne 1991. It has been noted that relationship marketing at the level of business to business exchange requires very different principles and techniques compared with relationship marketing between a company and numerous low value personal customers (Gummesson 1999).
Critics of the relationship marketing concept are numerous, both at an academic level among those who criticize the absence of theoretical positioning to the concept; among practitioners who may fail to see tangible benefits from implementing relationship marketing programs; and from consumers for whom attempts to develop relationships may be viewed with cynicism (Tzokas and Saren 1997; O'Brien and Jones 1995; O'Malley 1998). Reports of declining levels of loyalty by customers to organizations may be seen as evidence of the futility of relationship marketing programs, or may serve to emphasize the need for a more focused attempt at retaining customers. There is a view that in consumer markets, loyalty and ongoing relationships are illusory, and recently launched brands have been observed to have as much loyalty as longer established ones (Ehrenberg and Goodhart 2000).
The fragmentation of interest in relationship marketing into specialist subjects of study, including customer loyalty and database management may be symbolic of a need to keep hold of a "big new idea", or it may reflect the rapidly changing environment in which relationship marketing mutates and becomes stronger by changing its focus. Relationship marketing is probably best understood as an umbrella concept which stresses the need to see exchanges from a long-term perspective rather than short-term. The implementation of this philosophy is influenced by situational factors.
It is evident that there has been some semantic drift in the development of relationship marketing and the term relationship has itself often been used metaphorically to describe associations between two parties which are asymmetric in terms of power, knowledge and resources and which would probably not be described as a relationship in a social context.
The purpose of this paper is not to seek to understand semantic shifts in discussion of relationship marketing, but to identify the macro-environmental changes which impact on the development of relationship marketing. As a broad umbrella topic, relationship marketing emerged rapidly during the 1980s and 1990s. While part of this growth may have been partly semantic and based on a rediscovery of old principles, there were nevertheless powerful drivers in the macro-environment. If macro-environmental factors can explain the rise of relationship marketing, what does a reading of this environment suggest may be the future course of relationship marketing?
Macro-environmental explanations of the growth of relationship marketing
How can we explain the rapid rise in discussion of relationship marketing during the 1990s? The volume of literature on the subject would suggest the existence of some underpinnings of a "big new idea". This paper takes a normative approach to the study of the business macro-environment facing organizations that sell consumer goods and services. An environmental audit approach is adopted and four elements of the marketing environment analyzed under the overlapping headings of technological, social, economic and political/legal. A retrospective analysis is undertaken to try and understand the reasons that might explain the rise of relationship marketing during the 1990s. Following this, current and projected future environmental trends are examined and an assessment made of their likely impact on the future development of relationship marketing.
The technological environment
Many authors have attributed the development of relationship marketing to the ease with which technology can now allow large organizations to communicate with thousands, or even millions of individual consumers of their products (Zineldin 2000). It has been noted that computers have allowed corporations to recreate the personal relationships that SMEs had previously enjoyed ( Peppers and Rogers 1999).
In 1991, Ikujiro Nonaka began an article in the Harvard Business Review with a simple statement: "In an economy where the only certainty is uncertainty, the one sure source of lasting competitive advantage is knowledge" (Nonaka 1991). Knowledge was accessible to the owner of a small business who may have known each customer individually and able to assess their needs and credit worthiness without recourse to complex information systems. The link between business and customer was weakened in the era of industrialization and mass marketing when the management and owners of businesses became remote from their customers, with poor a infrastructure available for keeping in touch with customers. IT developments during the 1980s and 1990s effectively allowed companies to catch up with the pattern of relationships that had slipped away during the period of industrialization.
The loyalty program emerged as a relatively inexpensive means by which an organization can collect information about its customers (Hamilton and Howcroft, 1995). It has been noted that customer-specific loyalty programs are particularly valuable in situations where an organization has had little opportunity to gather in-depth information about each of its customers (O’Brien and Jones, 1995). Marketers have traditionally based their value propositions on information gained from small samples of customers, but during the past two decades, have increasingly been able to base decision making on analyses of their entire customer database. Many organizations have created data warehouses from which they can "mine" potentially useful information.
Although information technology has had the potential to add to a company's relationship advantage, this is dependent upon two principal factors: whether the company needs large volumes of information about its customers; and whether a relationship based program will provide information that the company did not previously have. It is also crucial that marketing mangers have the skills with which to handle large volumes of customer information. It has been noted that IT skills among senior marketing managers remain weak and many prefer to rely on instinct rather than data which is available from data warehouses (Morten et al 1999).
Trends for the future:
In business to consumer markets, an information imbalance has developed in which technology has been used by sellers manipulate an essentially passive audience of buyers. More recently, the proliferation of technology to households creates new opportunities for private consumers to become active managers of information about existing and potential sellers. Search engines, comparative web sites and intelligent buying agents have the potential to reduce the information imbalance between buyer and seller. It has been noted that consumers increasingly recognize that personal data has a value and are typically becoming more instrumental in the manner in which personal information is divulged (Marketing 1999). This represents a new challenge for relationship marketing in consumer markets, and may require a change in the attitude of some consumer marketers that relationship marketing is something that companies "do" to customers.
There is a further argument that over-reliance on information technology can lead to a proliferation of "me-too" solutions. In a changing environment, it is the quality of interpretation of data that gives a firm a competitive advantage in its use of information. If relationship marketing becomes formalized as a data-gathering exercise, the "feel" for customers which the SME owner traditionally enjoyed in their relationship with customers may never be achieved. It is a challenge for technology to create relationships which are regarded as sincere by all parties. To adapt a quotation of Graucho Marx, an organization which is able to fake and mass produce sincerity is likely to win out. While there has been much recent interest in “virtual” relationships and communities which are led by technology, there is a view emerging that technology cannot replicate holistic relationships based on social and physical contact.
There is also a view that technology will reduce the cost of acquiring new customers, thereby reducing the power of the argument that it costs typically 5 to 10 times as much to retain an existing customer compared to recruiting a new one. The Internet has the capability of reducing the cost of targeting potential customers and automated systems can reduce the cost of processing new customers. This may give added credence to the argument of the Ehrenberg school of thought that the most effective method of building customer loyalty is simply to build large volume (Ehrenberg and Goodhart 2000).
The social environment
A number of social phenomena may explain the rise of co-operative buyer-seller relationships in place of traditional confrontational, transactional exchange.
One steam of thought is that individuals' attitudes to co-operative business relationships may be the result of a much broader set of attitudes towards co-operation in general. It has been observed that the post 2nd world war period has seen one of the longest periods of sustained world peace in modern history, and the co-operative values associated with peace have permeated throughout society (Earley and Gibson 1998 ). Commentators have observed that following a prolonged period of world peace, traditional marketing strategy analogies based on confrontation no longer seemed appropriate (Gronroos 1994). The underlying relevance of innate co-operation to the development of commercial relationships has been seen as essential by some (e.g. Henderson 1989; Kante 1994) who stress the recognition by all parties of the gains which result from co-operative rather than competitive strategies. However, Darwinian theories may suggest that co-operation is not an innate human phenomenon, but individualism and competition may be crucial in creating a dynamic tension which moves a relationship forward (Palmer 2000).
It might seem interesting that individuals' relationships with commercial sellers have become more significant while their other relationships would appear to be in decline. During recent years, a number of commentators have noted the weakening of relationships which individuals in western cultures have with a number of institutions, especially the church and family. In the UK, regular church attendance has declined to below 5% while families have become more fragmented, demonstrated in the extreme case by a rising proportion of single person households, and by the “cellular” family in which each member functions with much greater autonomy (The European 1998).
How does relationship marketing fit this observed phenomenon? Based on the evidence of family and church life, cynics may argue that relationships per se are less sought as Darwinian theories of self-preservation take hold. But an alternative explanation may be that individuals’ networks of relationships have shifted, away from traditional networks based on the church and family, towards commercially oriented organizations. From a practical perspective, such sources provide an increasing range of services (e.g. care for children and the elderly) which were previously undertaken by family and church. The number of associates of an individual has been noted to be stable across cultures (Ridley, 1996) and relationships with companies provide new opportunities for individuals to gain identity and a position within society, replacing church and family as a source of identity.
A further intriguing social reason for the development of relationship marketing was the increasing role of women in buying and selling during the 1980s and 1990s. Numerous studies have pointed to the growing role of women, both as significant buyers of consumers products, and as managers responsible for company-customer encounters. There is an extensive body of literature on differences in personality traits which exist between males and females. One important area of difference is in the way that males and females develop relationships with others, with masculine gender traits being characterized as aggressive and instrumental, while feminine traits are more commonly associated with showing empathy and resolving conflicts through reconciliation (e.g., Keys, 1985; Riger & Gilligan, 1980; Statham, 1987; Palmer and Bejou 1995). Recent moves from warfare approaches to business exchange toward collaborative approaches may appear novel when judged by the stereo-typical value systems of males, but may be considered normal by the value system of females. Although there is the possibility of role conflict, women as buyers and sellers are likely to bring values to commercial exchanges which are more relational than transactional.
Finally, the need for greater social responsibility has encouraged the development of business-consumer relationships in some sectors. Legislation and voluntary codes of conduct have recognized that it is unethical to sell many types of services without the seller first entering into some form of relationship with the seller to establish their needs. In the UK, the Financial Services Act 1986 effectively made some form of relationship compulsory for companies selling various long-life, high risk financial services. The absence of such relationships and an over-emphasis on transactional exchanges has led to many financial services providers being fined by regulatory bodies for failing to establish the true needs of their clients.
Trends for the future
The notion that we are living in a new era of peace in which co-operation rather than confrontation is the norm is open to challenge. Even the idea that we live in an era of world peace is ambiguous, for it has been noted that the last twenty years of the twentieth century witnessed more local wars than the first half of the century (Sardar,1999). An increasing willingness of consumers to challenge authority and, as consumers to complain about poor service may weaken the case for an increasingly co-operative society (Caudron 1994).
It has been suggested that consumers are increasingly seeking instant gratification, evidenced by the popularity of instant delivery of goods and services through the medium of the Internet. How do ongoing relationships fit into a scenario where consumers make short-term evaluations of a transaction? A presumption of relationship marketing is that through co-operation, each party invests in a relationship in the expectation that they will receive a payback at some time in the future. For the customer, this may take the form of a loyalty reward, or an augmented standard of service. For the seller, the payback may be a long and profitable series of sales.
Finally, consumers have raising expectations of the ethical and social welfare standards of commercial organizations. There are now many well documented cases of companies who have acted in an unethical or anti-social manner and incurred bad publicity. Buyer-seller relationships have the potential for a wide range of unethical practices, for example football teams who exploit their supporters’ relationship with the team by changing their strip each year (or more frequently) and expecting their loyal fans to invest in the new one. If the quality of relationships is to continue to be a source of competitive advantage, the ethical standards by which relationships are conducted are likely to become increasingly important to consumers.
The economic environment
Two important economic arguments have been advanced to explain the development of relationship marketing in the 1980s and 1990s. Firstly, there is the familiar argument that it is more cost effective to retain existing customers than to continually recruit new customers to replace lapsed one. This argument was of course nothing new, but information technology has allowed for more precise tracking of customers and the development of personalized retention strategies. Secondly, the quality of buyer-seller relationships emerged as a point of sustainable competitive advantage. A previous pre-occupation with tangible design properties in the 1960s was followed by a pre-occupation with augmented services (e.g. financing, warranty and maintenance services) but this itself was replaced in the 1990s by competition on the basis of superior ongoing relationships.
Relationship marketing also arose at a time when the choice available to consumers within most product categories increased markedly. Buyer behavior models are essentially concerned with understanding how buyers simplify their choice processes in order to reduce the psychological cost of a decision and it has been noted that buyers' motivation to enter into a relationship with a seller is essentially based on a desire to reduce their choice set and simplify their choice process (Sheth and Parvatiyar 1995).
Future trends
It was noted earlier that one of the underlying principles of relationship marketing is the cost effectiveness of retaining existing customers rather than continually recruiting new ones. During a period of media inflation, the cost of communicating with new and potential customers may have given some basis to this argument, although empirical evidence remains limited. With the falling cost of Internet media, this assumption may be challenged. The futility of pursuing customer loyalty where no relationship is sought may be strengthened by evidence from Ehrenberg that consumers are typically fickle and that distribution of relationship length is broadly similar for new brands as for long established brands (Ehrenberg and Goodhart 2000).
Other phenomena, often enabled by new technology pose challenges for relationship marketing. The emergence of “auction” websites such as QXL.com place much more of the onus of relationship management on the consumer. In such an environment, what becomes of marketers’ models of relationship pricing? The mass enabling of consumers to initiate and guide relationships with suppliers has potential to redress the power imbalances which have so far been typical of business to consumer relationships. Far from being the end of relationship marketing as we know it, this enabling of consumers opens up new challenges and possibilities for the marketer. Power may be of little relevance to consumers if it does not bring goods and services which consumers value.
Business to consumer relationships may also be challenged by an apparent increase in consumers’ confidence. This may be borne out of rising education levels; legislation which increasingly protects the rights of consumers and the growing variety of television programs which champion consumers’ rights. These have helped to reduce the power imbalance between consumers and sellers.
Finally, it was noted that markets have evolved from a primary focus on tangible product features, to a focus on augmented services and finally to a focus on relationship quality. Advance to the next stage has occurred where saturation had been reached at the previous stage and firms were no longer able to use that positioning as a source of competitive advantage. But what happens if relationships reach a similar stage of equalization between the main players? What next will be the basis for differentiation?
The political / legal environment
The political environment of many western economies during the 1990s emphasized a desire to dismember state monopolies and to develop competitive markets. The outsourcing of many functions traditionally carried out by government organizations (and by large private sector firms) created the need for close co-operation between autonomous units in place of previous unified command and control structures. In Williamson's terminology, outsourcing of peripheral functions through networks of supplier's leads to a transition from hierarchies to markets, with hybrid organizations being the end result.
Simultaneously, governments of many western countries have sought to outsource many services provided to consumers (e.g. many health and pension services) and encouraged the development of ongoing relationships between the two parties. Sometimes this has been enshrined in legislation, as in the case of private pension provisions where the existence of some form of relationship is a prerequisite to advice being given by a pension provider.
Future trends
The political environment may have given support for the development of relationship marketing, but more recent reading of the environment may suggest greater caution. Attitudes towards freely competitive markets with minimal state involvement appear to have been toned down, in Britain at least. From the extreme views of the Thatcher era, a more pragmatic attitude towards workable competition and a role for state enterprise has been increasingly recognized (Weatherill 1996).
There is also increasing concern that co-operation which is favourable to the participants may have harmful consequences for public welfare (Staber, 1998; The Economist, 1998). While legislation to curb anti-competitive business practices has traditionally been aimed at horizontal relationships within a distribution channel, there is mounting evidence of regulators' involvement in vertical supply relationships. As examples, the EU Commission has in recent years held British Airway's favored relationships with selected travel agents to be against the public interest while the UK Monopolies and Mergers Commission has held the exclusive freezer supply relationships operated by the Walls company to be a restrictive practice in the UK impulse ice cream market ( Mortishead 1999 ; Gray 1998).
Political ideology may have contributed to the development of relationship marketing, but growing recognition of the negative impact of buyer-seller relationships may act as an increasing constraint.
There is an another dimension in which the political environment can be seen to have influenced the development of relationship marketing. The mounting level of consumer protection legislation in most western countries raises the issue of whether an ongoing relationship with a supplier continues to reduce buyers' level of perceived risk, when legislation may have a similar effect of reducing such risk. In the financial services sector for example, it is becoming increasingly difficult for consumers to lose money as a result of bad advice. Knowing that compensation is likely to be available for the results of bad advice may reduce the value of a trusted relationship.
CONCLUSION / MANAGEMENT IMPLICATIONS
Relationship marketing as it has developed during the past two decades is firmly based on change in the business environment of organizations. It is too simplistic to say that it is nothing new or simply a big idea spun out of long standing practice. There are many factors in the business environment which explain why the concept became a dominant idea of the 1990s. Many of the changes which gave rise to Relationship Marketing will still have effect in future decades, so the concept will still be with us. However, the challenge of relationship marketing is to recognize the subtle changes in the business environment and to adapt to them. The reduction in power imbalances between consumers and commercial organizations through the development of consumer focused technology will call for a reinvigoration of consumer relationships. The desire for sincerity in relationships in some sectors may put pressure on companies to improve qualitative aspects of their relationships with customers. The use of customer ties is likely to be increasingly challenged by regulatory authorities as being anti-competitive.
It has been widely accepted that relationship marketing at the philosophical level differs very little from general definitions of marketing, and this is likely to continue to be the case. However, in its evolution, new strands of specialization are likely to emerge. The emergent technology has spurned new areas of study in the form of database marketing, for example. Inevitably some semantic drift will occur as big new ideas are promoted to highlight specific areas. The concepts of data mining, for example may not be entirely new to statisticians but as a subset of relationship marketing is likely to be received by an eager audience seeking to get more out of its databases.
Relationship marketing is not new and it is not a passing fad. There are sound reasons to explain its emergence and that it will need to adapt to change in the environment if it is to remain an important paradigm.
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