Relationship marketing and the consumer

Conclusion

Collectively, the responses of the individuals interviewed reveal that there is a multitude of reasons for participating in a marketing relationship. Although many of the reasons are cognitive in nature, many others are affective. This affective “dimension” of relationship marketing remains unexplored but would seem to offer great promise for explaining the long-term nature of a firm-consumer relationship. Moreover, a liberal interpretation of the collective responses of the interviewed individuals suggests an alternative fundamental axiom of relationship marketing consistent with the definition of Angeles (1992):

Consumers enter into a marketing relationship because they expect to receive positive value from their participation.

Acceptance of this axiom would seem to suggest a conceptualization and research agenda much broader and potentially more productive than that associated with the axiom currently being offered.

Sheth and Parvatiyar have raised a question that, despite its obviousness in retrospect, has yet to be addressed satisfactorily. Hopefully their article will prove to be the genesis of an answer. Although no one is likely to agree with all of their propositions, or even their speculation that relationship marketing will ultimately improve marketing productivity, Sheth and Parvatiyar have done the discipline a service by focusing attention on a neglected topic. Indeed, what they have effectively done is to challenge the discipline to debate what they believe to be the fundamental axiom of relationship marketing in consumer markets. Regardless of the outcome of this debate, marketing knowledge will have advanced.