facturer whose fortunes were revived with the help of an alliance
with Honda, a Japanese competitor. Rover embraced the notion of
an ‘extended enterprise’ and, despite its premature ‘divorce’ from
Honda following its sale to BMW, Rover continues to work with its
suppliers and dealers towards the development of a seamlessly inte-
grated supply chain.
Further perspectives
The Six Markets model provides the basis for a simple framework to
convey the complex reality of relationship marketing. While it does
not attempt a detailed identification of individual relationship
forms or partners (these are time and situation specific), it has the
potential to provide a strategic overview of relationship marketing;
its scope, nature and purpose. However, the business landscape has
changed a great deal since Christopher, Payne and Ballantyne first
attempted to produce a conceptual framework for relationship mar-
keting, and early indications from on-going empirical research
suggest that certain aspects of the model would benefit from further
consideration.^40
Firstly, throughout the 1990s there has been an upsurge in man-
agement interest in all aspects of process integration. This interest
extends beyond the notion of the internal value chain, to entire
value systems reaching upstream to suppliers and downstream
through intermediaries, distributors and retailers to the end user or
ultimate consumer. The importance of supplier relationships and
their role in relationship marketing was already well established
within the Six Markets model; more problematic is its treatment of
the downstream market relationships. It does not overtly distin-
guish between intermediaries or distributors as customers and end
users or consumers. For the many organizations involved in busi-
ness to business marketing, this is an important distinction.
Secondly, there is the matter of scope. The original Six Markets
model subsumed alliances and partnerships within the ‘supplier’
market domain and did not make explicit enough some of the more
sophisticated horizontal forms of interorganizational collaborations
and strategic alliances, including joint development projects
between competitors or equity sharing joint ventures. From his
globalist vantage point, management consultant and writer Kenichi
Relationship marketing: The six markets framework 11