Marketing and Customer Relationship Management

Cătoiu, Iacob Article Marketing and Customer Relationship Management Amfiteatru Economic Journal Provided in Cooperation with: The Bucharest University of Economic Studies Suggested Citation: Cătoiu, Iacob (2009) : Marketing and Customer Relationship Management, Amfiteatru Economic Journal, ISSN 2247-9104, The Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Vol. 11, Iss. 25, pp. 233-236 This Version is available at: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/168663 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. 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If the documents have been made available under an Open Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Amfiteatru Economic recommends AE Vol XI • Nr. 25 • February 2009 233 MARKETING AND CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT Iacob Cătoiu Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Romania e-mail: [email protected] This spring the thirty-fifth title in the prestigious collection The Marketing Library published by the Uranus Publishing House has appeared: Marketing et Gestion de la Relation Client (Marketing and Customer Relationship Management) – written by Professor, Ph.D. Nicolae Al. Pop and Lecturer, Ph.D. Eva- Cristina Petrescu. The book is a new work in the complex domain of relationship marketing and customer relationship management. Marketing et Gestion de la Relation Client (Marketing and Customer Relationship Management) is an original study that puts forward a new perspective on modern marketing, both through an insightful theoretical approach and through a practical method based on interesting and instructive case studies. The theoretical approach of the book starts from the idea that the marketing activity should focus on clients and partners rather than on products. Moreover, the idea that enterprises should focus on keeping existing costumers and encouraging consumption rather than attracting new clients is highlighted in the book. The book – written and published in French – is structured in three parts that cover three major topics in contemporary marketing: the way marketing has moved from transactional to relationship marketing, the key elements for understanding consumer behavior and the main characteristics of marketing research. Marketing et Gestion de la Relation Client (Marketing and Customer Relationship Management) is a pioneering work in the domain of relationship marketing and customer relationship management, a fact underlined by Professor, Ph.D. Virgil Adăscăliţei in the foreword to the book. Professor Virgil Adăscăliţei is one of the first specialists in marketing to tackle the issue of relationship marketing in Romanian specialized literature. In the first part, the book studies the way marketing evolved from the traditional transactional marketing to relationship marketing. Based on sound scientific grounds, the book presents and analyses theories in national and international specialized literature and suggests an original and realistic view on modern AE Marketing and Customer Relationship Management Amfiteatru Economic 234 marketing. The idea that modern marketing should be customer-oriented lies at the foundation of this vision. The second part of the book is dedicated to the study of consumer behavior, a central element in the marketing activity. The marketing orientation of any modern enterprise is based on – as required by the concept of marketing – knowing and forecasting changes in its environment and especially in its most important component – the market. This is the subject of the first chapter in the second part of the book. In this part, the features of the market as a meeting point for consumers and the company are presented and analyzed and fundamental ideas and theories related to the company’s orientation towards customers are put forward. This type of orientation has been determined by a series of processes specific to the contemporary economy, such as the globalization phenomenon, the increase of competition, the advance of modern means of communication that lead an increasing number of companies towards intensive development. The orientation of companies towards the customer is focused on satisfying clients’ needs and desires, and achieving this goal effectively has lead to the development of the Customer Relationship Management concept. Customer Relationship Management is a part of the management activity of the company targeted at achieving the loyalty of customers towards the company and/or the products, services and brands it offers on the market. Understanding consumer behavior is the starting point in Customer Relationship Management. Therefore in the following chapters the main characteristics of consumer behavior are analyzed and the decision-making process when purchasing a product is detailed. Special attention is given to the analysis of consumer satisfaction, to modalities of gaining consumer loyalty and to managing complaints. The marketing activity cannot be conceived unless there is a continuous and systematic flow of information regarding the internal and external environment of the organization and the dynamics of the relationship with outside parties. Information is a sine qua non condition, one of the primary resources for managing the marketing activity on scientific grounds. Moreover, the information is essential for ensuring the organic integration of the marketing activity in the system of the other activities of the company and also it is vital in order to have a high degree of adaptability to environmental conditions with a view to satisfying at superior standards the demands of the market and increasing efficiency. In order to answer to these requirements companies need a key activity: marketing research. In the third part, the methods and techniques used in marketing research to study the consumer and consumer behavior are presented in detail. Amfiteatru Economic recommends AE Vol XI • Nr. 25 • February 2009 235 Conducting marketing research presupposes a series of successive stages in a complex process starting with establishing the purpose and the objectives and ending with the presentation of the conclusions and recommendations. Each stage consists of a series of activities that can take place at the same time or in a certain sequence. Conducting successfully a marketing activity involves doing a large number of activities which require making numerous decisions on behalf of the researchers. In order to accomplish successfully the research process knowing and understanding the stages is absolutely necessary. Therefore in the first chapters of the third part the objectives of marketing research targeting knowing the consumer and the stages of marketing research are emphasized. In designing a marketing research choosing the modalities of assessment and scaling of the phenomena investigated is crucial; hence the options regarding information gathering tools as well the modalities for analyzing them. In the fourth chapter of this part the scales used in the study of customer base are presented. Any marketing research implies not only solving problems regarding measuring the phenomena investigated, but also selecting the techniques and methods for gathering, processing and analyzing information. In chapters five and six the methods of creating instruments used in direct marketing research are presented, as well as the methods for analyzing results. In the book Marketing et Gestion de la Relation Client (Marketing and Customer Relationship Management) the objectives of marketing research related to knowing the consumer, the stages of marketing research, the scales used in studying the customer, as well as the rules of design, collection and analysis of information in qualitative and quantitative marketing research are clearly presented. The theoretical aspects presented and analyzed are explained by numerous practical examples, the book thus becoming a useful tool in marketing research and in the study of the customer for specialists and practitioners in marketing, as well as for students. Through the theories presented and analyzed and the scientific methods suggested for studying the relationships a company has with its clients, we consider that Marketing et Gestion de la Relation Client (Marketing and Customer Relationship Management) is a book that represents an important contribution to the development of modern marketing and to the improvement of knowledge in the field, thus constituting a notable reference point in specialized literature. AE Marketing and Customer Relationship Management Amfiteatru Economic 236 About the authors: NICOLAE AL. POP - Professor PhD at the Marketing Department at the Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest. Domains of competence: relationship marketing, strategic marketing, international marketing, international marketing research. He is Research adviser in marketing. Professor at the University of Applied Sciences of Bochum (Germany) 1996-1997. Visiting professor at the University „J. W. Goethe” Frankfurt am Main (Germany), the Technical University of Darmstadt (Germany), the University of Klagenfurt (Austria), ISCAE Casablanca (Morocco), the Technical University of Budapest (Hungary), the University of Trier (Germany), HEC Montreal (Canada), the University „Babeş-Bolyai” Cluj-Napoca, the Polytechnics University of Bucharest. He is Dr. Honoris Causa of the Oradea University and Director of the MBA program „Management antreprenorial” – in German – at FABIZ –ASE Bucharest. He has published 18 books and university courses in prestigious publishing houses in Romania and abroad. He won the „Virgil Madgearu” award of the Romanian Academy for the book „Marketing”, The „Encyclopedia of the year 2003” award of AGER for the book „Marketing. Dicţionar explicativ”. He is dean of the Faculty of Business Administration in Foreign Languages, ASE Bucharest. EVA-CRISTINA PETRESCU PhD in Economics, specialization marketing. She is Lecturer at the Marketing Department at the Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest and Graduate of the Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest (Faculty of Economic Studies in Foreign Languages) and of the University of the Orléans (Institut d’Administration des Entreprises d’Orléans). She is author of the book „Marketing în asigurări” (Insurance Marketing). She has published 10 books, over 35 articles and numerous studies on topics related to insurance marketing, services marketing, business to business marketing, marketing research, the study of consumer behavior.