Relationship marketing 35
Contributions to the relational paradigm
from services marketing include the develop-
ment and understanding of service encounters
(Solomon et al., 1985), internal marketing
(George, 1977; Gr ̈onroos, 1978; Berry, 1983;
Gummesson, 1987), service design (Shostack,
1984) and service quality (Parasuraman et al.,
1985). Although viewed as distinct research
streams within services marketing (Fisk et al.,
1993), they share many common themes. In
particular, there is an emphasis on the
interaction process (relationship marketing,
service encounter and service design), and
on creating and understanding quality from
the point of view of the customer (service
quality and internal marketing). Specific con-
tributions from research in services marketing
which develop our understanding of relation-
ship marketing include the following
conclusions:
Service provision can be customized to suit
the specific requirements of the buyer
(Lovelock, 1983).
The development of formal, ongoing
relationships is a viable strategy in attempting
to engender and build customer loyalty
(Lovelock, 1983).
The nature of services forces the buyer into
intimate contact with the seller (Gr ̈onroos,
1978).
The service encounter (interaction) has an
important impact on customers’ perceptions
of, and satisfaction with, the service
(Gr ̈onroos, 1983, 1994).
Service encounters facilitate the development
of social bonds (Crosby and Stephens, 1987;
Berry and Parasuraman, 1991).
The SERVQUAL gap model emerged as a
useful managerial tool that distinguishes
between actual qualityandcustomer-perceived
quality(Parasuramanet al., 1985, 1988).
Customers assess services on the basis of
bothtechnicalquality (the quality of the service
itself) and functionalquality (the quality of the
service delivery process) (Gummesson, 1987;
Gr ̈onroos, 1990).
The importance of part-time marketers(i.e.
those individuals who are service providers but
probably not marketing personnel) was
recognized and highlighted (Gummesson,
1987).
Internal marketing using a marketing approach
within the business to target employees was
recognized as an important tool in ensuring
service quality (Gummesson, 1987; Gr ̈onroos,
1994; Berry, 1995) and was posited as integral
to relationship management.
Not all service encounters are necessarily
relational, only those which are extended,
emotive or intimate (Crosby et al., 1990; Price
et al., 1995).Contributions from
business-to-business marketing
The major contribution in this area comes from
the IMP research in Europe. Researchers within
the IMP fail to agree on the exact meaning of
the acronym, with some suggesting that it is the
Industrial Marketing and Purchasing Group
and others referring to the International Mar-
keting and Purchasing Group (see Ford, 1997).
The problem occurs because industrial (or
business-to-business) marketing in Europe is,
by definition, international. IMP researchers
relied primarily on qualitative methodologies
(observation, interviewing managers and
archive data) within a number of case studies in
order to explore interorganizational exchange.
This work resulted in the recognition that
relationships are important to the facilitation of
interorganizational exchange (often more
important than price) and that the interaction
between buyer and seller organizations was
integral to the formation and maintenance of
relationships. A detailed review of the Inter-
action Approach was published in a very
influential book (Håkansson, 1982). Indeed, this
view of interaction and relationships is integral
to the subsequent development of the relational
paradigm. The major contribution of the Inter-
action Paradigm was the recognition (in con-
trast to the mix management paradigm) that