Relationship Marketing Strategy and implementation

Creating and implementing relationship marketing strategies 409

Whilst individual businesses will need to redefine these processes to
fit their own particular circumstances, it is self-evident that the cre-
ation of customer value is achieved through these fundamental
tasks. In a sense these core processes are the means by which we
attain the goal of ‘the right product in the right place at the right
time’. Thus, in a consumer packaged goods business the specific
value-generating processes could be defined as in the example
shown in Figure 6.1.

The critical features of processes are that they are market facing,
they are integrative – cutting across conventional functions and
hence must be managed on a cross-functional basis – and, most
importantly, they are the means by which customer and consumer
value is generated and determined.

Proactive/personalized service

One of the keys to success in the demanding markets in today’s
developed economies is the way that customers are supported and

●Consumer equity

●Leveraging deep understanding of the consumer to define and communicate spe-

cific value proposition that meets both the needs of individual consumer seg-

ments and the corporation’s strategic/financial goals.

●Product development

●Designing and continuously redesigning product concepts to ensure that they

deliver the ‘right’ value proposition to targeted consumers.

●Supply chain management

●Sourcing, producing and delivering the right combination of benefits – both prod-

ucts and services – to retail customers at the lowest possible total cost.

●Customer management

●Leveraging deep knowledge of consumers and category dynamics to develop

selling and supply chain strategies that benefit both trade customers and con-

sumer products manufacturers.

Source: Armstrong (1996).^6

Figure 6.1 Core processes in consumer packaged goods.