Mapping the re-engagement of CRM with relationship marketing

Purpose - This paper aims to reframe and enhance the relationship marketing literature through advocating an emphasis on process and a renewed commitment to social and informational exchanges. Design/methodology/approach - The paper is conceptual. It takes as its starting-point the recognition that customers exist in complex dynamic systems in which they enact multiple roles. However, current implementations of customer relationship management (CRM) typically only view customers through a single lens (as customers) that denies firms a holistic view of those with whom they interact. Moreover, CRM systems typically embed and script actions (i.e. call centre options, offers driven by cross-selling and segmentation) rather than enabling rich communication and facilitating appropriate responses that emerge from that communication. It is argued here that, as a consequence, both parties to a relationship need to negotiate the nature of systems that connect them, because those systems, in part, determine the content of relationship exchanges. Practical implications - Understanding of the central argument will contribute to better organisational-customer interactions and more informed relationship management techniques. Originality/value - The paper argues for a renewed emphasis on processes and on social/informational exchanges within those relationships. This initiates a process of frame restructuring that will benefit RM.