So far, our discussion of customer relationships, customer experience, and customer value has shown how businesses are undergoing a vast cultural shift—transforming from the mass marketing, product-siloed thinking of the Industrial Age to the customer-based culture of the Information Age, where the primary goal is building relationships with individual customers who become measurably more valuable to the enterprise. In this new business era, managing individual customer relationships means an organization will use the knowledge gained from these relationships to improve the quality of the overall customer experience. Consequently, it is incumbent on the enterprise to understand what constitutes a relationship, how relationships are formed, and how they can be strengthened or weakened. Many different perspectives have been developed about what comprises customer relationships and how businesses can profit from them. So before we can move forward with our discussion of becoming a customer-focused enterprise, we need to explore a couple of views besides our own about relationships.

Continuing Roles for Mass Media and Branding

• Communicate to nonusers who have not yet raised their hands.
• Build image and brand identity.
• Establish a brand position with nonusers to help users make a statement about their own image.

Characteristics of a Genuine Business Relationship

• Mutual
• Interactive
• Iterative
• Provides ongoing benefit to both parties
• Requires a change in behavior for both parties
• Unique
• Requires—and produces—trust

Thinking about Relationship Theory

Julie Edell Britton

Associate Professor, Fuqua School of Business, Duke University

Special thanks to Josh Rose for his contribution on this topic for the first edition of this book.

Personal and business relationships have many similarities. In a marriage, for example, the two individuals agree to exchange only with one another as long as the balance of trade is favorable to both and greater than what can be derived from the greater market.a The benefits of a successful marriage include companionship, intimacy, personal growth, shared finances, and shared household responsibilities and must be perceived to provide value to both relationship members if it is to continue. Buyer-seller relationships, whether between an enterprise and an individual consumer (B2C) or between enterprises (B2B), are made up of similar components and follow a similar development process. In this section we will review these relationship components in more detail and provide a way of thinking about relationships that will help us explore the ways businesses build relationships with customers.

The process of relationship formation between individuals provides a fitting analogy to the formation process of business relationships between buyers (customers) and sellers (enterprises). Relationships between individuals are typically formed through a systematic, multistage process. While the process might vary, the main building blocks are the same: identification, establishing rapport, information gathering, initial interaction, and intensification of interaction through commitment. For the relationship to succeed, certain elements or guidelines must be followed. For example, proper identification requires a basic understanding of the type of individual one is seeking to meet. Establishing rapport requires adaptation to the other party’s interaction style. Information gathering has to be relevant and provide insight into the likes and needs of the other member.

Types of Buyer-Seller Exchanges

Not all buyer-seller exchanges can be characterized as relationships. Some are merely transactional. Many enterprises have only just begun to think about their customers as parties with whom they might want to have a sustained relationship (and vice versa). In organizations focused on the sales of products, each transaction was thought of as a discrete transaction with no correlation to any prior or future transactions. Thus, exchanges can be viewed as existing on a continuum between discrete transactions on one end and relational or collaborative exchanges on the other.

The concept of a discrete exchange involves money on the one side, an easily measured commodity on the other, and the complete absence of any relational element. It is characterized by very limited communication and narrow content. In its abstract form, it is an instantaneous exchange between anonymous parties who will very likely never interact in the future. Economically, the transaction is a zero-sum game. (See the discussion about mass marketers in Chapter 1.) The more one party receives, the less remains for the other party. As an example of a discrete transaction, imagine an out-of-town consumer passing through a town stopping to purchase five gallons of unbranded gasoline for $14 paid in cash to an independent station. This transaction is discrete. There have been no previous transactions, there is no way to know who made this one, and no future ones are anticipated.bAs the exchange moves to the right in the continuum (see Exhibit 2.1), it has the potential to become more relational. Perhaps a customer traveling across the country repeatedly purchases the same brand of gasoline. To the customer, then, these transactions are related. When she buys this brand, she expects that it will provide the same level of performance as the last tank of gasoline provided, even though the price, service, location, and other factors may vary. Whether these transactions are seen as discrete transactions to the gasoline seller or as having a connection depends on whether that seller can relate the transactions over time to this particular customer. If the customer pays for each of these transactions with her gasoline-company credit card, then the company has the potential to recognize the connection between the transactions and determine whether she is someone with whom it would like to build a relationship. At this point, the customer is visible and identifiable as a customer, not just a series of discrete, independent transactions.

EXHIBIT 2A Transaction/Relationship Continuum

Relational exchanges transpire over time with each transaction acting as a link in a chain having a history and an anticipated future. In contrast to the situation where there is no relational content in the discrete exchange, participants in relational exchanges share information and hope to improve on the quality of the exchange for both the customer and the enterprise. This often means that the nature of the deliverable becomes less obvious, necessitating deeper discussion, preplanning, and, most important, trust. Especially in uncertain environments, cooperation is required to meet the needs of both parties.

The significance of the difference between the characteristics of exchanges on either end of the continuum lies in the extent to which relational exchanges contribute to product or service differentiation that create incentives to remain in the relationship, thus creating a competitive advantage. As a relationship deepens, it becomes increasingly difficult for either party to see how other parties could provide the same degree of benefit as received by the existing relationship.

An alternative mapping of the realm of buyer-seller relationships is represented by the matrix in Exhibit 2B. Here each party’s interest in developing the relationship forms a dimension. Some relationships are not symmetric; the two parties view the relationship differently. If a seller has a great deal of interest in developing a relationship but the buyer does not, we might see repeated attempts by the seller to extract information from the consumer, but the consumer failing to respond. Conversely, when the buyer has a great interest in developing a relationship with the supplier, she might contact the enterprise and provide them feedback about how they could better meet her needs, but the enterprise is uninterested in using that information to customize its offerings to her. Note that the continuum described in Exhibit 2A exists along the main diagonal of the Exhibit 2B matrix. Purely discrete exchanges exist when neither buyer nor seller is interested in developing a relationship, while strong relational exchanges exist only when both parties have a great deal of interest.

EXHIBIT 2B Relationship Development Process

Relationship Development Process

An understanding of how relationships develop provides insight into how to improve and to maximize the benefits from the relationship. In their classic inventory of relationship development, Dwyer, Shurr, and Ohc suggest that B2B relationships evolve through five general phases:

Throughout the relationship development process, certain elements act as enhancing agents. Communication, defined as formal or informal sharing of information through two-way interchange, positively acts to strengthen the relationship. Although not specifically required, especially given recent advancements in personalized electronic communication, personal contact can lead to increased commitment and to development of customer trust.e (The role of trust in buyer-seller relationships is significant and will be described further later in this section.) Cooperation, defined as coordinated actions taken by both relationship members to achieve mutually desirable outcomes, enhances the development process by increasing the communication component, prolonging the exchange, and providing a sense of future reciprocity. While conflicts can have negative impacts on the relationship, effective conflict resolution can have a positive influence. Reaching mutually agreeable compromises without the use of formal procedures increases the sense of trust and commitment of the relationship members.

Finally, the Learning Relationship process,f in which enterprises and customers engage in a series of interactions that serve as a continuous feedback loop, allows each party to learn about the other (needs, preferences, responsiveness) while at the same time learning about itself. The Learning Relationship process can be employed at every phase of the development process just outlined. Viewing each phase as an opportunity for learning via a feedback loop allows the relationship to develop faster and to a deeper level. Exhibit 2C provides a conceptual representation of the ideas put forth in this section.

EXHIBIT 2C Learning Relationship Process

Relationship Building Blocks

The previous section provided an overview of the relationship development process. Here we provide a more granular perspective by analyzing the six most important building blocks, or key mediating variables, that are required for relationships to form. Relational building blocks are not to be confused with relational contingencies (i.e., reasons why relationships form), such as necessity, efficiency, and stability.g Rather, the building blocks uniformly influence the resulting nature of the relationship, irrespective of the originating motive.

Exhibit 2D provides a representation of the building blocks as they influence relationships. The position of the individual building blocks on the discrete/relational continuum is representative of its relative importance to relationship formation. For example, “Trust” is located closest to the relational side since it is more important to the relationship-forming process than “Symmetry,” which is located closest to the discrete side. The box with the curved bottom side preceding each building block contains the antecedents, or conditions, for the block. The rectangle that follows each block shows the aspects of the relationship it impacts.

EXHIBIT 2D Relationship-Forming Building Blocks

Trust

Trust is defined as one party’s confidence in the other relationship member’s reliability, durability, and integrity and the belief that its actions are in the best interest of and will produce positive outcomes for the trusting party. As evidenced by the abundance of literature on the importance of trust in the formation of relationships, the presence of trust is central to successful relationships.h As an illustration, consider the situation where a consumer pays for a one-year subscription to a magazine. The magazine has not yet been produced, and its content and quality are subjective and unknown at the time of payment. Trust that the service provider will live up to its obligation is what allows the exchange to proceed. [We discuss more about trust in the Learning Relationship process in Chapter 3.] The benefits of a relationship based on trust are significant and are described next.

• Cooperation. Trust serves to mitigate feelings of uncertainty and risk, thus acting to engender increased cooperation between relationship members.i By increasing the level of cooperation, members learn that joint efforts lead to outcomes that exceed those achieved individually.
• Commitment. Also a relationship building block that entails vulnerability, commitment will be formed only with trustworthy parties.j
• Relationship duration. Trust encourages relationship members to work to preserve the relationship and to resist the temptation to take short-term gains and or act opportunistically. Trust of a seller firm is positively related to the likelihood that the buyer will engage in future business, therefore contributing to increasing the duration of the relationship.k
• Quality. Trusting parties are more inclined to receive and use information from trusted partners and in turn to derive greater benefit from the information.l Furthermore, the existence of trust allows disputes or conflicts to be resolved in an efficient and amicable way. In the absence of trust, disputes are perceived as signals of future difficulties and usually bring about relationship termination.

Trust is clearly very beneficial and important to those seeking to establish a relationship. However, becoming a trusted party is not easy and requires concerted effort. The next factors are the main contributors to formation of trust.

• Shared values. Values are fundamental to the development of trust. The extent to which parties in a relationship share beliefs regarding appropriate behaviors, goals, and policies influences the ability to develop trust in one another. After all, it would be difficult to trust a party whose ideas about what is important and appropriate are inconsistent with one’s own.
• Interdependence. Dependence on another party implies vulnerability. To reduce the associated risk, parties will seek out relationships with others who can be trusted.
• Quality communication. Open and frequent communication, whether formal or informal, serves to align expectations, resolve disputes, and alleviate uncertainty associated with exchanges. For communication to result in formation of trust, it must be frequent and of high quality; in other words, it must be relevant, timely, and reliable. While past positive communication leads to trust, trust—in turn—leads to better communication. To establish and maintain relationships, it is important that organizations use the information to shape appropriate responses to customer needs.m
• Nonopportunistic behavior. Behaving opportunistically is fundamental to discrete exchanges. After all, there is only one shot at maximizing benefits. However, long-term relationships based on trust require that participating parties are not solely self-serving and act to increase shared long-term benefits. John Deighton suggests that if customers lose trust in firms and believe that their data are used for purposes of exploiting them, they will keep their data private or distort the data.n

Commitment

The second building block in the relationship formation process is commitment. Commitment is the belief that the importance of a relationship with another is so significant as to warrant maximum effort at maintaining it. Like trust, commitment is viewed as extremely important in the formation of customer relationships. As Morgan and Hunt state in their seminal article, “The Commitment-Trust Theory of Relationship Marketing,” “The presence of relationship commitment and relationship trust is central to successful relationship marketing. . . . Commitment and trust lead directly to cooperative behaviors that are conducive to relationship marketing success.”o

Generally, there are two different types of commitment: calculative and affective. Calculative commitment results from an economic analysis of the costs and benefits of making a commitment. For example, the decision to commit resources to an enterprise to develop a new technology might result from the lack of other potential relationship members in the market or from the inability to obtain the necessary services/products at a lower price outside the relationship. Calculative commitment is related negatively to trust and is based on calculated cost and benefits. It is thus not conducive to a long-term successful relationship. In contrast, affective commitment is based on the continuation of the relationship not just because of what its economic benefits are in the short term but because each of the parties feels an emotional or psychological attachment toward the other relationship member. Affective commitment is positively related to trust and thus supports relationship benefits much longer in duration, decreased opportunism, and the willingness to resolve conflicts in a way that is amicable to both parties.

Since commitment entails vulnerability, parties seek relationships with those who are trustworthy. Hence trust is a strong contributor to commitment. Along similar lines, communication and open exchange of information can be used to create a positive attitude toward relationship members and also can be used to reinforce the benefits of the relationship. Relationship members who demonstrate the ability to deliver superior benefits will be highly valued by others, who will gladly commit to a relationship. Finally, relationship members who are in a position of power who do not revert to coercive tactics, even when they can, will be perceived positively, thus increasing the likelihood of long-term commitment to a relationship.

Satisfaction

The third relationship building block is satisfaction. The overall role that customer satisfaction plays in the formation of relationships is intuitive: A dissatisfied customer generally will seek to replace the supplier with an alternative, if it is available. The converse is also intuitive: Satisfied customers generally are more inclined to remain in the relationship. While it is accepted that there exists a positive relationship between customer satisfaction and customer loyalty, the relationship between customer satisfaction and the duration of the relationship is more complex.

As enterprises seek effective ways to have relationships with customers, many have turned to the traditional tool of customer satisfaction monitoring. Customer satisfaction tools have long been used to understand customer perceptions of products and services, but now they are also being used to monitor customer relationships. Mithas, Krishnan, and Fornell found that firms with customer relationship management (CRM) applications are positively associated with an improvement in customer satisfaction.p By contacting customers directly by telephone, enterprises can demonstrate to their customers that they are interested in them as customers and value their input. Enterprises strive to uncover the reasons for customer dissatisfaction without alienating or losing customers entirely. Automobile repair services companies, in fact, that call their customers for a customer satisfaction survey have experienced an increase in repeat business as a result.q

The duration of the buyer-seller relationship depends on the customer’s subjective assessment of the value of a relationship that is continuously updated based on perceptions of previous experiences.r Customers tend to weigh prior satisfying experiences more heavily than they do new experiences. This fact is consistent with the relationship benefits of trust and commitment identified earlier, and it has some interesting managerial implications. It suggests that new customers are far more vulnerable to relationship mishaps than customers with longer satisfying relationships. Companies must focus more closely on customer satisfaction during the early stages of the relationship. Early mishaps have a higher probability of resulting in a defection than if the same problems occurred after a satisfying relationship had been more firmly established. We might think of this as the basic principle of first impressions.

Customers also weigh negative experiences, or losses, more heavily than they weigh positive experiences, or gains. Companies attempt to entice customers to stay longer by attempting to improve existing satisfaction levels. This is known as the Satisfaction Trap,s in which companies become preoccupied with satisfaction ratings scores at the expense of attention to relationship duration. Focusing on improving the customer experience (i.e., more gains) should not come at the expense of assuring the lack of customer mishaps. In fact, customers with longer satisfying relationships tend to evaluate recent negative encounters against previous levels of satisfaction. Thus, for longer-duration customers, emphasis should be placed on preventing negative encounters.

Uncertainty and Dependence

Two related variables that influence the relationship formation process are the degree of uncertainty in the environment and the degree to which relationship members are dependent on each other. Dependence as a contingency for relationship formation is rooted in the scarcity of resources (product, services, etc.). Relationships are formed when each relationship member has access to resources essential to the other.t By working together, relationship members secure better access to essential resources than working independently. Uncertainty impacts the availability of resources, thus creating the dependence. By forging relationships, parties are able to gain better control over their environment in order to reduce uncertainty. In B2B relationships, “resources” takes on a broader meaning to include access to markets, creating market entry barriers, and strategic positioning.

Relationships based on uncertainty and/or dependence tend to be less stable as they focus on current existing conditions. Changes in external conditions, availability of resources, and environmental uncertainty could modify the original parameters that once justified the formation of the relationship, such that the resulting relationship no longer provides mutual benefits. In addition, as dependence is not a strategically desirable situation, relationship members will constantly seek relationships that provide them with more favorable positioning. Thus, while dependence plays a role in long-term relationship development, it is not sufficient to maintain the relationship. An element of trust also is required for a dependence-based relationship to have a long-term orientation.u

Fairness

The fifth relationship building block is fairness. While relationship quality is a somewhat subjective term, it is plausible to measure relationship quality based on the levels of trust, commitment, and ability to effectively resolve conflicts. The higher the levels of these contributors, the greater the quality of the relationship. High-quality relationships result in lower levels of conflict, greater expected continuity, and greater willingness of members to invest in the relationship and thus lead to more successful long-term relationships. Research has shown that the perception of relationship fairness also enhances relationship quality.v

There are two distinct types of relationship fairness: distributive and procedural. Distributive fairness is based on the perception of relationship rewards versus relationship burdens or obligations and is therefore more focused on relationship outcomes. Procedural fairness is based on the perception that procedures and processes used are fair and is therefore more focused on behaviors, independent of the outcome. Viewed in the context of a relationship, distributive fairness is influenced by a combination of elements that may or may not be under the control of the relationship members. It is entirely possible that a relationship fails not because of the actions of either the buyer or seller, but rather because of an act of nature, like a new baby, or a job transfer that necessitates a move. In contrast, procedural fairness is influenced largely by elements under the control of the relationship members, such as notifying the buyer if she is on the wrong subscription plan rather than allowing her to continue to pay a higher price than necessary. CRM activities create the potential for differential treatment of customers who interact with a firm. Reitz provides examples where airline customers do not perceive differential treatment to be unfair.w

Of the two types, procedural fairness has a much stronger effect on the development of trust and commitment and is therefore a stronger contributor to the development of an effective long-term relationship. Procedurally fair-exchange systems have a more enduring quality and are more likely to constitute the basis for a sustainable relationship. It is especially important that the stronger relationship member develops processes and procedures that other relationship members judge to be fair, in order to sustain the relationship in times of disagreements.

Symmetry

The final relationship building block to be discussed is symmetry. Relationship symmetry refers to the degree of equality between relationship members. It is a function of many relationship elements, including information sharing, dependence, and power. Symmetric relationships are more stable than asymmetric ones. This is because asymmetry undermines the balance of power and creates motivation for the stronger party to take advantage of the weaker party, especially in difficult economic conditions.x Commonality of interests is strongest when the relationship is symmetric. Symmetry discourages the development and expression of conflict because the relationship members have equivalent stakes in the relationship. In contrast, parties in asymmetric relationships are more likely to have diverging interests and greater motivation to engage in conflict; thus such relationships are more dysfunctional and less stable.y

Asymmetric dependence is a specific type of symmetry. Dependence describes the (lack of) options that one may have to replace the relationship member, or a measure of one party’s need to maintain the relationship in order to achieve its goals. Symmetric interdependence exists when the relationship members are equally dependent on each other. As the difference in the relative dependence between the members increases, the relationship becomes more asymmetric and less stable. From the perspective of the less dependent, or stronger, member, structural impediments preventing opportunistic behavior are reduced. The more dependent member may feel vulnerable, seek to better his relationship position, and be constantly looking for a more favorable relationship.

To increase relationship quality, relationship members should seek to lower the level of asymmetry and increase the degree of interdependence. Achieving perfect symmetry in a relationship is extremely difficult and fairly rare. Reducing the degree of asymmetry or modifying the relative dependence of relationship members is a more achievable goal. The more vulnerable member can reduce dependence by developing additional relationships with others. Alternatively, the more vulnerable member can increase dependence by increasing her value to the relationship. Of the two approaches, the more dependent member should seek the latter. Striving for autonomy by seeking alternatives may reduce the level of asymmetry, but it will come at the expense of relationship benefits.z

Finally, it should be noted that trust and commitment can develop in asymmetric relationships, if the vulnerable party is treated fairly and with respect. While the more powerful relationship member might be tempted to act unfairly by imposing self-serving procedures, avoiding these behaviors can lead to a more lasting relationship that provides greater benefits.aa

aM. McCall, Courtship as Social Exchange: Some Historical Comparisons (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1966).

bIbid.

cIbid.

dIbid.

eK. Ruther, L. Moorman, and J. Lemmink, “Antecedents of Commitment and Trust in Customer-Supplier Relationships in High Technology Markets,” Industrial Marketing Management 30, no. 3 (2001), 271–286.

fB. Joseph Pine, Don Peppers, and Martha Rogers, Ph.D., “Do You Want to Keep Your Customers Forever?” Harvard Business Review 73, no. 2 (March-April 1995), 103–114.

gC. Oliver, “Determinants of Interorganizational Relationships: Integration and Future Direction,” Academy of Management Review 15, no. 2 (1990), 241–265.

hSee the classic introduction by C. Moorman, R. Deshpande, and G. Zaltman, “Factors Affecting Trust in Market Research Relations,” Journal of Marketing 57, no. 1 (1993), 81–101.

iB. Squire, P. D. Cousins, and S. Brown, “Cooperation and Knowledge Transfer within Buyer-Supplier Relationships: The Moderating Properties of Trust, Relationship Duration, and Supplier Performance,” British Journal of Management 20 (2009): 461–477; T. Dagger, P. Danaher, and B. J. Gibbs, “How Often Versus How Long: The Interplay of Contact Frequency and Relationship Duration in Customer-Reported Service and Relationship Strength,” Journal of Service Research 11 (May 2009): 371–388; R. Morgan and S. Hunt, “The Commitment-Trust Theory of Relationship Marketing,” Journal of Marketing 58, no. 3 (1994), 20–38.

jDagger, Danaher, and Gibbs, “How Often Versus How Long: The Interplay of Contact Frequency and Relationship Duration in Customer-Reported Service and Relationship Strength,” Journal of Service Research 11 (May 2009): 371–388; R. Morgan and S. Hunt, “The Commitment-Trust Theory of Relationship Marketing,” Journal of Marketing (1994).

kDagger, Danaher, and Gibbs, “How Often Versus How Long”; P. Doney and J. Cannon, “An Examination of the Nature of Trust in Buyer-Seller Relationships,” Journal of Marketing 61, no. 2 (1997), 35–51.

lSquire, Cousins, and Brown, “Cooperation and Knowledge Transfer within Buyer-Supplier Relationships”; Dagger, Danaher, and Gibbs, “How Often Versus How Long”; Moorman, Deshpande, and Zaltman, “Factors Affecting Trust in Market Research Relations.”

mS. Jayachandran, S. Sharma, P. Kaufman, and P. Raman, “The Role of Relational Information Processes and Technology Use in Customer Relationship Management,” Journal of Marketing 69, no. 4 (2005), 177–192.

nJ. Deighton, “Privacy and Customer Management,” Customer Management (2005).

oMorgan and Hunt, “The Commitment-Trust Theory of Relationship Marketing.”

pS. Mithas, M.S. Krishnan, and C. Fornell, “Why Do Customer Relationship Management Applications Affect Customer Satisfaction?” Journal of Marketing 69, no. 4 (2005), 201–209.

qC. Gengler and P. Popkowski Leszczyc, “Using Customer Satisfaction Research for Relationship Marketing: A Direct Marketing Approach,” Journal of Direct Marketing 11, no. 4 (1997), 36–41.

rIbid.

sF. Reichheld, The Loyalty Effect: The Hidden Force behind Growth, Profits, and Lasting Value (Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1996).

tSquire, Cousins, and Brown, “Cooperation and Knowledge Transfer within Buyer-Supplier Relationships”; W. Keep, S. Hollander, and R. Dickinson, “Forces Impinging on Long-Term Business-to-Business Relationships in the United States: An Historical Perspective,” Journal of Marketing 62, no. 2 (1998), 31–45.

uS. Ganesan, “Determinants in Long-Term Orientation in Buyer-Seller Relationships,” Journal of Marketing 58, no. 2 (1994), 1–19.

vN. Kumar, L. Scheer, and J. Steenkamp, “The Effects of Supplier Fairness on Vulnerable Resellers,” Journal of Marketing Research 32, no. 1 (1995), 54–65.

wB. Reitz, “Worst to Favorite: The Inside Story of Continental Airline’s Business Turnaround,” Customer Management (2005).

xE. Anderson and B. Weitz, “Determinants of Continuity in Conventional Industrial Channel Dyads,” Marketing Science 8, no. 4 (1989), 310–323.

yIbid.

zC. Lai, “The Use of Influence Strategies in Interdependent Relationship [sic]: The Moderating Role of Shared Norms and Values,” Industrial Marketing Management 38 (May 2009): 426–432; Kumar, Scheer, and Steenkamp, “The Effects of Perceived Interdependence on Dealer Attitudes.”

aaV. Belaya, “Measuring Asymmetrical Power Distribution in Supply Chain Networks: What Is the Appropriate Method?” Journal of Relationship Marketing 8 (2009): 165–193.

Cultivating the Customer Connection: A Framework for Understanding Customer Relationships

James G. Barnes

Professor Emeritus, Faculty of Business Administration, Memorial University of Newfoundland; CEO, BMAI-Strategy

The establishment of relationships is a fundamental part of human life. Most people have many different relationships, some of which have lasted for many years, and some of which are closer or more intimate than others. When we ask people about their relationships, most often they speak of those that are most important to them, namely relationships with family, friends, neighbors, classmates, or the people with whom they work. Some of these relationships are very important to us, and we would feel a tremendous sense of loss if the people involved were no longer around. We trust them, we rely on them, and they play a central role in our lives.

What is really interesting is that people typically use very similar language when they talk about businesses with which they deal or brands that they buy regularly. Can customers establish a long-lasting relationship with a brand of ketchup, a coffee shop, or a hotel chain? I suspect the folks at Heinz, Starbucks, and Marriott would unanimously agree that they can and do. We can all think of brands that we and our families have been using for years or even for generations. We all have favorite restaurants, a regular pub or sports bar, a deli where Julie behind the counter knows exactly how thick to slice our pastrami, and a hairdresser to whom we have been going for years.

Customers Are People Too

At the end of the day, customers are people, and they bring to the role of “customer” the same set of needs and emotions that they exhibit in other facets of their daily lives. If a business is interested in establishing genuine relationships with its customers, relationships that will last for many years, then it must understand the psychology that underlies the establishment of relationships in general.

Customers do not deliberately set out to establish relationships with other people or with brands of shampoo, cologne, or beer. Relationships evolve over time, and some evolve to the point where there is an extremely strong connection with the company or brand. Relationships take time to develop and must be nurtured. But once they are established, customers feel a genuine, long-lasting sense of loyalty to the company. Most customers want to deal with businesses and use brands that they can trust and rely on, organizations with which they feel comfortable and that treat them fairly and honestly. Unless business executives understand how customers develop such relationships and what customers get from them, they will not begin to understand how to build a solid customer connection.

It is only in recent years that business has begun to focus its attention on the development of customer relationships and to acknowledge that customers do indeed develop strong emotional connections to certain companies and brands. Most businesses now understand the potential long-term value of a loyal customer. It is clearly more productive for a business to encourage its customers to come back and do business with it over and over again rather than having to deal with customer churn, where new customers must be recruited in a constant struggle to replace those who are leaving. One of the objectives, therefore, in building customer relationships is to reduce customer turnover by increasing retention.

Retention Is Not a Relationship

But customer retention is not the same as a customer relationship. Retention, meaning that customers continue to buy from a company over time—they have been retained—is essentially a behavioral concept. There are many ways in which businesses succeed in encouraging customers to return, none of which leads to the establishment of customer relationships. Retention is behavioral loyalty; relationships imply the existence of emotional loyalty.

A relationship in its simplest form and as understood by customers is based on feelings and emotions. It is not behavioral, although there are behavioral outcomes of customers developing solid relationships with firms: customers go back again and again; they spend more money there; they buy more items at full price rather than waiting for the sales; and they recommend the company or brand to their friends and associates. But such behavior is the result of the relationship and not the relationship itself.

There is, however, a tendency in some businesses to mistake behavior for loyalty. Just because customers buy a large percentage of their items in a particular product or service category from a certain company or visit on a regular basis does not mean that they are loyal or that a relationship exists. It is possible for a company to develop a high level of “behavioral loyalty” among its customers while having relatively little emotional loyalty. For example, many customers will buy a large percentage of their groceries from a supermarket that is close to their homes. They shop there every week and they have been doing so for years. When asked why they are “loyal,” customers will point to factors such as convenience of location, 24-hour opening, large parking lots, speedy checkouts, one-stop shopping, and so on. All of these reasons relate to functional factors that drive repeat buying. These customers may be described as “functionally loyal” because the factors that drive their behavior are largely functional.

Among the functionally loyal, there is a notable absence of any sense of attachment to the company. There is little or no emotional connection. If these behaviorally loyal regular shoppers were to move across town or to a new city, they would likely seek out an equally convenient supermarket for most of their grocery shopping. This form of loyalty, therefore, is extremely vulnerable; there is no relationship from the customers’ perspective. As soon as they see a better deal or greater convenience elsewhere, they’re gone.

Contrast this with other customers who shop regularly at the same supermarket, often driving past two or three competing supermarkets to get there. When asked why they shop where they do, they will say that they are known there, employees recognize them, they feel comfortable shopping there, they have come to know the cashiers and engage in conversation with them, or they go there with friends for coffee. There is among this group of customers evidence of emotional loyalty, a connection between the company and its customers, a lasting bond that is grounded not in functional factors but in genuine emotions. When these customers move to a new location, they seek out a branch of their supermarket.

Let’s Have a Relationship with Her

Customer relationships develop over time, just as do interpersonal relationships. No company or brand can simply decide that it will establish a relationship with a particular group of customers and then go out and do it, because it is the customers themselves who will decide whether a relationship can develop. Relationships are, by definition, two-sided in nature; they must be mutually felt. We all know what happens to relationships where only one of the parties is getting any benefit. Therefore, in order to attract customers to the point where a relationship might be said to exist, a company must genuinely care about its customers. For a customer relationship strategy to work, a company must establish a focus on the customer, a commitment to genuinely understanding the customer, and a culture in which every employee believes that the customer comes first. In short, the company needs to have a customer strategy, one focused on ensuring that everything the company does is oriented toward building solid customer relationships.a

Think for a moment about those businesses and brands to which you and your family return again and again. You probably wouldn’t do so unless you were receiving some unique form of value that you simply can’t get anywhere else. You feel special when you walk through the door. The employees know you there and treat you like a friend. They engage in conversation with you and go out of their way to help you find the things you need. You trust their advice. You know you can rely on them to deliver on time and offer you quality products at a reasonable price. Actually, you may even admit that you may be paying a slightly higher price than you could get from a competing business nearby, but it is worth it to you because of the other, less tangible things that you derive from the relationship.

By thinking about the relationships that you, your friends, and family have already established with businesses, we begin to reveal some of the essential characteristics of genuine customer relationships. You don’t go back to your favorite businesses only because they have the lowest price in town or because they have a frequent-shopper program. You go back primarily because of how you are treated, the quality of service provided, the people with whom you deal, and ultimately how you are made to feel.

I make an important distinction between genuine customer relationships and those that are artificial or synthetic. Some companies, through the use of marketing tools such as frequent-shopper or frequent-flyer programs, have succeeded in creating high levels of behavioral loyalty, driven largely by the rewards that customers obtain by giving a company a large share of their business. Do such programs succeed in driving an increased share of wallet and repeat buying? Yes, in many cases they do. But such attempts to build customer relationships are not based on a strategy to create an emotional connection but rather see relationships from the perspective of the company and the benefits that it will derive from increased frequency of purchase.

At the end of the day, it is the customer who understands what a customer relationship involves. One of the difficulties that some businesses have in establishing long-lasting customer relationships stems from the fact that many simply don’t understand their customers.

The Need for Insight

One of the fundamental needs that underlies the establishment of successful customer relationships is for companies to obtain the kind of insight necessary to understand what is actually a very complex concept. They must understand customers, and they must understand the nature of the genuine relationship. If we are to truly understand the emotional connection between customers and brands, then we need to understand how customers live their daily lives and where various companies and brands fit in. What role do they play? What does Heinz ketchup, or Starbucks Coffee, or Chanel No. 5 really enable a customer to do? What does The Home Depot, or State Farm, or Wells Fargo help customers accomplish?

To obtain customer insight, we must understand customers as people. We need to understand what they need to get done in their daily lives, what their goals and ambitions are, and how they define success. By knowing such things, a business can understand how it can play a role in allowing customers to accomplish the things that they want to get done and to achieve success. However, insight gathering also involves understanding the things that customers wish to avoid or that they dread happening. Understanding those things that customers do not want to happen allows a business to step in and help customers to prevent them. Understanding the complexities of consumer behavior and how customers develop lasting relationships requires deep thinking on the part of marketing practitioners.b

Companies that are successful in building genuine relationships with customers are rewarded well into the future. Not only do they experience lower rates of customer turnover, but their customers stay with them longer, give them a higher share of spend, buy more items at full price, reduce their tendency to shop around, and recommend the company or brand to their friends and family members. Think again about those companies and brands that you couldn’t do without and how you deal with them. That’s how genuinely loyal customers treat their favorite stores and brands.

A Framework for Understanding: The 5 Es of Customer Relationships

This section represents a framework that I have developed that helps me think more deeply about the concept of customer relationships and the factors that are important in allowing companies and brands to connect more closely with their customers. I’ve labeled it the 5 Es of Customer Relationships: environment, expectations, emotions, experience, and engagement.

Customer Environment

If a company is to be successful in establishing genuine relationships with a large number of its customers, it must first have a deep understanding of the environment in which the customer operates. We are dealing here with the notion of customer context; everything that customers do happens within a wider context. Every day, customers have things they must get done; they face challenges and opportunities. There are things that they are looking forward to and things that they dread. Companies, if they are to understand how to build relationships, must first understand what is going on in the personal and business lives of their customers: What are their goals; what are they trying to accomplish; what are they looking forward to? Only by knowing such things can a company play the role of partner or facilitator in helping its customers get those things done.

Many years ago, Harvard professor Theodore Levitt famously observed that no customer ever went out to buy a quarter-inch drill bit. What the customer needed, of course, was a quarter-inch hole. This was Levitt’s insightful way of saying that all products and services are bought not for their own inherent features but for what they enable their buyers to do; people need solutions to what they are facing. More recently, Christiansen, Cook, and Hall have written about the job that we hire products to do,c suggesting that the customer at the supermarket this afternoon doesn’t really want or need those raspberries he is buying; what he really wants is an attractive dessert to serve his guests at dinner. Every product and service the customer buys represents a means to an end; he has something that he needs to get done. It is no accident that The Home Depot adopted as its slogan “You can do it; we can help.”

Even more recently, Ariely and Norton have written of “conceptual consumption,” arguing that customers buy products and services not only for the outcomes they provide but even more for the feelings or emotions those products enable them to enjoy or avoid.d Therefore, we buy digital cameras not only to enable us to have photographs to show friends or to post on Facebook or to put up on Picasa but, more important, to enshrine memories and to facilitate sharing. Similarly, we don’t buy paint merely to obtain a fresh new look in the living room but to hear the “oohs” and “aahs” of friends and neighbors.

To be able to facilitate success by enabling customers to achieve the things they need to get done, to receive the accolades of friends, or to look good in the eyes of people who are important to them, companies must understand the context in which customers are operating. Companies that succeed in helping customers achieve the praises of guests for a dessert well made or the favorable comments of visiting parents-in-law when they enter the recently decorated living room will be well on their way to establishing genuine customer relationships.

Customer Expectations

It probably goes without saying that, in order to be successful in impressing customers, companies should set out to at least meet customer expectations. The company that falls short of meeting expectations can be confident that customers are already moving on to deal with one of its competitors. Meeting customer expectations is obviously of great importance, but it is not sufficient to move customers toward the establishment of genuine relationships.

Research has shown that customers have considerable difficulty verbalizing what they expect from the companies with which they deal.e My experience is that customer expectations are, for the most part, entirely predictable and bounded by the customer’s experience in dealing with similar companies or brands. For example, if we were to ask a customer who is planning a business trip to Chicago what she expects of the airline that will be taking her there, she is likely to comment that she expects to be able to buy her ticket online, to check in from her office, to be able to check her suitcase efficiently, to have her flight depart and arrive on time, and to find her suitcase intact on the luggage carousel when she arrives.

In short, the customer expects the airline to do exactly what well-run airlines are expected to do, nothing more. The customer will be satisfied if the airline delivers on those things that she expects of it and will likely give it a 9 or even a 10 in a post-flight customer satisfaction survey if they get all of these things right. But satisfaction does not make a relationship. Satisfaction is a short-term state driven mainly by predictable, functional aspects of the company’s value proposition. Other research indicates that even the most satisfied customers remain receptive to competitive offers and are prone to defect.f A customer relationship that has achieved only satisfaction is a vulnerable one.

What our airline customer is not expecting may be just as important as what she expects of the airline. She is clearly not expecting a flight attendant to retrieve the BlackBerry that she has left in the seat pocket and to bring it to her as she stands at the baggage carousel. These are the kind of events that customers don’t think of when they are asked to state their expectations. Yet by delivering the BlackBerry, the flight attendant has exceeded subconscious expectations and created a state of customer delight. That episode then becomes the basis for storytelling; you know, the ones that always begin “You’ll never believe what happened to me yesterday . . .”

From the company’s perspective, it is as important to understand what customers are not expecting as it is to know what they are expecting. Ultimately, customers are not expecting to be surprised. Creating customer surprise, by doing the unexpected, is an important part of building genuine, emotion-based customer relationships. As Lehrer recently observed, “Nothing focuses the mind like surprise.”g Companies should set out to surprise and delight their customers more often.

Customer Emotions

Relationships are essentially emotional constructs. When asked about their most important relationships, most people will make mention of other people with whom they are close: family members, friends, neighbors, workmates, our Saturday morning foursome, the girls on the bowling team. In other words, people generally use the word relationships when discussing interpersonal connections. But customers also build emotional connections with companies and brands—ultimately reaching a stage where they would miss them if they were no longer available.

In attempting to build genuine customer relationships, companies must, therefore, set out to reduce negative emotions and strengthen positive ones. It is useful, in this regard, to think about a hierarchy of emotions, ranging from relatively weak emotions to particularly strong ones. On the negative side, some fairly mild emotions are merely irritants. For example, a customer may experience confusion, annoyance, or frustration in dealing with a certain business. These feelings may not lead the customer to decide never to deal with the company again but, if left unaddressed, may lead to a situation where the customer simply walks away, or at least Twitters negatively. If a company continues to frustrate, disappoint, let down, or ignore its customers, ultimately more strongly felt negative emotions, such as anger, hatred, and disgust, will emerge and any hope of developing a long-term relationship will be lost.

However, positive customer relationships that last for years or even decades begin with some relatively weak positive emotions, such as comfort level, friendliness, and affection. Ultimately, the strongest and longest-lasting customer relationships are characterized by deep positive emotions that are regularly referred to by loyal customers, including love, pride, and respect. In research projects that I have conducted with a major telecom company and an international grocery chain, we found more than 70 percent of customers agreed with the statement, “I am proud to be a to customer.” We regularly hear shoppers comment, “I just love shopping there.”

Customer Experience

There has been a lot of attention paid in recent years to the customer experience, and it represents an important contribution to an expanded view of how relationships develop.h Simply put, a succession of positive experiences is likely, over time, to develop into a genuine relationship. However, inconsistency in the delivery of the customer experience—or, worse, a series of negative experiences—will lead to little hope of solid relationships being developed. Unfortunately, many businesses seem to take a narrow view of what customer experience entails. As a result, they fail to realize the potential that exists to create long-lasting customer relationships through delivering impressive customer experiences.

Some writers on the subject of customer experience suggest that it is something that can be orchestrated or that must involve some form of entertainment.i But every interaction with a company or brand is an experience, whether it involves face-to-face contact with employees, telephone interaction with a call center, visits to the Web site, or actual use of the product. My research suggests that companies need to think about customer experiences at four levels.

First, and this is the view of customer experience that is most often discussed in business, companies must be easy to do business with. This assumes that customer experience is all about access and convenience; how easy do we make it for customers to order from us, to get served in our stores, to speak with someone on the telephone? Being “easy to deal with” means returning their calls, delivering when we said we would, and generally not putting barriers in the way of good service.

Second, I believe that an important part of the customer experience involves interaction with employees. Many customer experiences involve meeting or talking with employees or others who represent the company or brand. This interpersonal interaction is central to the development of a positive customer relationship. Indeed, many customer relationships are based on the customer’s relationship with individual employees—think travel agents, mechanics, and hairdressers. This view that the customer experience is delivered or co-created by employees suggests implications for human resources departments and is one of the main reasons why HR must be an active partner in the development of a customer relationship strategy.

Third, we must realize that the customer experience does not end when the customer makes the purchase—there is “product in use” experience. Many services, for example, are continuously delivered. The customer, therefore, has an ongoing relationship with banks, cable and telecom companies, Internet service providers, and others. In the case of tangible products, many are used for months if not years. The satisfaction and enjoyment that the customer obtains from “product in use” is important in determining whether a long-term relationship will develop. So, an important part of the customer experience involves delivery, helping set up the product, helping the customer obtain maximum value from it, fixing it when it breaks, and offering advice on how to use it properly. Often this seems to be forgotten by businesses. I hear, for example, from customers of auto dealers who do not receive any communication for the entire length of the four-year lease. Customers feel let down, disappointed, or abandoned as a result. Companies need to have a “keep in touch” strategy, making occasional meaningful contact with customers as they use their products and services.

Finally, businesses need to think about the customer experiences that they can create or enhance. This represents a proactive side of customer experience delivery. Think about the kinds of experiences that companies create by organizing workshops, inviting customers to lectures, or providing them with valuable information. Think, for example, how The Home Depot helps the “all-thumbs” father build that tree house for his son. Think also about how Avis might make my long weekend in the Napa Valley truly memorable. Think how Canon might help me get a “You took that!!??!!” reaction when my friends see the framed black-and-white photo in my living room.

Customer Engagement

Recently, customer relationship strategists have begun to consider the importance of creating customer engagement.j This concept builds on the notion that, by involving customers more in the production and delivery of products and services, we can create a higher level of commitment. How, for example, can we get customers to become partners, to become involved in the co-creation of products and services, to become actively engaged in the delivery of desired solutions and outcomes? This is, I believe, an important part of the success that IKEA has enjoyed around the world. Not only does this much-admired company offer reasonably priced furniture of reasonable quality, but the customer puts part of himself into every item through his involvement in its assembly.

Dell allows its customers to build their own laptop computers. Customers go to The Home Depot to learn how to lay ceramic tile or to build shelves in the kids’ closet. Committed customers of the Running Room train together with other novice runners for their first 10K race. In all cases, the customer puts something of herself into the creation of the value proposition by partnering with the business to get something done. An engaged and involved customer is more likely to spread positive word-of-mouth, to create communities for the business, leading to a co-dependency that eventually becomes a solid, genuine relationship.

Overview

The most successful customer relationships are those grounded in an emotional attachment. Companies must accept the fact that, if they hope to see customers coming back again and again and sing their praises to friends and family members, they must pay attention to how they make their customers feel. To really impress their customers, they will also have to invest in customer insight so they can truly understand what those customers need to get done and how they need companies and brands to help them. Customer relationship building should not be seen as the sole or even the principal responsibility of the marketing department; in fact, building customer loyalty must be accepted as the responsibility of every employee.

aJ. G. Barnes, Build Your Customer Strategy: A Guide to Creating Profitable Customer Relationships (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2006).

bGerald Zaltman and Lindsay Zaltman, Marketing Metaphoria: What Deep Metaphors Reveal about the Minds of Consumers (Boston: Harvard Business Press, 2008).

cC. M. Christensen, S. Cook, and T. Hall, “Marketing Malpractice: The Cause and the Cure,” Harvard Business Review 83 (December 2005): 74–83; C. M. Christensen, S. D. Anthony, G. Berstell, and D. Nitterhouse, “Finding the Right Job for Your Product,” MIT Sloan Management Review 48, no. 3 (2007): 38–47.

dD. Ariely and M. I. Norton, “Conceptual Consumption,” Annual Review of Psychology 60 (2009): 475–499.

eV. A. Zeithaml, L. L. Berry, and A. Parasuraman, “The Nature and Determinants of Customer Expectations of Service,” Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science 21, no. 1 (1993): 1–12.

fR. L. Oliver, Satisfaction: A Behavioral Perspective On the Customer, 2nd ed. (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2009).

gJohan Lehrer, How We Decide (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009).

hSee, for example, Christopher Meyer and Andre Schwager, “Understanding Customer Experience,” Harvard Business Review 85, no. 2 (February 2007): 117–126.

iB. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore, The Experience Economy: Work Is Theatre and Every Business a Stage (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1999).

jJ. H. Fleming and J. Asplund, Human Sigma: Managing the Employee-Customer Encounter (New York: Gallup Press, 2007).

Attitudinal loyalty without behavioral loyalty has no financial benefit for a firm, but behavioral loyalty without attitudinal loyalty is unsustainable.

Loyalty Programs

A “loyalty program” is a promotion that awards points, miles, or other benefits to a customer in exchange for the customer’s doing business with the program’s sponsoring company. Also known as a frequent-shopper or frequent-flyer program, loyalty programs are sometimes referred to as “frequency marketing.” The distinction between behavioral and attitudinal loyalty, however, suggests an important criterion for evaluating the benefits and effects of whatever loyalty program a company implements.

Probably the most commonly found type of program is one that simply awards prizes to customers and ends right there, with little effort put into transforming the company’s subsequent behavior or “treatment” of individual customers to reflect the needs or preferences revealed by the customer’s own transactions. The problem is that while awards and prizes will in fact generate behavioral loyalty, by themselves they amount to little more than bribes for customer transactions—really, just a sophisticated form of price competition. The faux loyalty generated will have little impact on customer attitudes or intentions, as evidenced by the fact that most consumers are members of several different loyalty programs for competitive firms simultaneously.

A more effective kind of loyalty program is one that uses the information provided by a customer’s rewarded behavior to fashion more relevant, personalized, or satisfying services or offers for that individual customer, thereby earning more and more of the customer’s attitudinal loyalty as well. In this kind of program the discounts and prizes given to customers are, in effect, incentives to ensure that the company can accurately track customer transactions and interactions over time, allowing it to compile a useful profile of customer needs and to tailor future offers and experiences for that customer. Tesco, the largest grocery retailer in the United Kingdom, uses the information generated by its Clubcard program to tailor each of its mailing pieces to each of its millions of Clubcard member households individually, through mass-customized printing capabilities.a Each mailing piece includes personally relevant offers for its addressee and represents incremental income for Tesco, based on an estimated 25 percent response rate. (In Chapter 4, we talk more about how Tesco’s capability to identify individual customers contributes to its success.)

Loyalty programs have become ubiquitous marketing tools in a variety of industries, from grocery stores and airlines to credit-card and packaged-goods retailers, restaurant chains, and others. They are even used as a tool for managing and engaging employees and for encouraging healthy lifestyle habits. As these kinds of programs have proliferated, however, a few important “best practices” have emerged, which we can summarize in this way:

• Never waste an opportunity to gain insight about a customer. An effective loyalty program will offer a choice of services or treatments that reveal something about a customer’s personal preferences. For example, if customers can identify their own prize in advance, the company can gain additional insight into what motivates particular customers. Loyalty programs in financial services, for instance, take advantage of the insights gained by identifying someone who chooses an award for lifetime achievement compared to one who chooses the largest prize for short-term behaviors. Providing points in return for completing surveys or responding to inquiries can also generate insight.
• An effective program offers modularity, enabling participants to mix and match aspects to their own preferences. Modular offerings are a practical way to allow for customer-driven personalization of a program without going to the extreme of full customization. Key aspects of the program, such as member qualification, can be developed with several alternatives, and customers can be offered a set of guided choices to select from. A sophisticated marketing approach would offer different sets of choices for different groups of customers based on their value—so everybody wouldn’t be choosing from the same set. For example, a lower-value customer might choose from rewards alternatives that include a service upgrade, while high-value customers might have choices that include additional redemptions or alternative merchandise. In addition, modularity will allow a program to incorporate partners and cosponsors more easily.
• Consumers value openness. They want a service or program that works with other programs. The more open a loyalty program is, the more beneficial and attractive it will be to customers. Transferable points and rewards offer the customer the greatest flexibility in using program earnings. As a program gains confidence and customer insight, it can mature to a more and more open proposition without endangering customer loyalty, because the barrier to a customer’s switching will no longer be pure economics (i.e., the value of the points earned) but convenience (having to “teach” another program about individual desires and preferences). Openness is inevitable in loyalty marketing programs, and companies must choose whether to lead the charge or to react to it.
• A loyalty program should be managed around customers, not products. The customer-strategy firm will align the organization of a loyalty program around certain identified sets of customers and then measure people by the positive impact they have on customer behaviors within these different groups. The marketing effort should be organized so that the customers whose behaviors are intended to be affected are the responsibility of managers whose evaluations are based on improving the numbers. This is the most direct way to make progress in each customer segment and to improve the loyalty (and lifetime values) of the individual customers in each segment.
• Above all else: simplicity. A program with fewer rules and restrictions is more engaging to the customer. It’s better for a company to narrow its offers to those that can be delivered dependably rather than to include elements that can’t be relied on. Airline programs frequently suffer, for instance, when they offer high-value redemptions that are not very readily available. Such offers often do more harm than good, by unnecessarily raising customer expectations and then not delivering. If a company can’t deliver reliably on what it promises in its loyalty program, it risks undermining trust in the brand.

a“Tesco Clubcard Signs Up One Million Customers since Relaunch,” Marketing Magazine, October 5, 2009, available at: www.marketingmagazine.co.uk/news/943397/Tesco-Clubcard-signs-one-million-customers-relaunch/, accessed September 1, 2010.