IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbrese/v64y2011i7p749-756.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Why customers won't relate: Obstacles to relationship marketing engagement

Author

Listed:
  • Ashley, Christy
  • Noble, Stephanie M.
  • Donthu, Naveen
  • Lemon, Katherine N.

Abstract

Due to the challenges associated with reaching consumers using traditional marketing approaches, firms increasingly rely on relational marketing tactics to increase customer patronage with the firm. Yet, consumers often actively avoid relational devices. Thus, firms have a heightened interest in factors that affect customer engagement in relationship marketing efforts. This research provides an empirical test of a model based on equity theory and previous findings regarding psychological engagement. The model predicts whether customers are willing to engage in different relational tactics offered by firms, measured by a formative, actionable Relationship Program Receptiveness (RPR) Index. The results indicate customer perceptions of the inconvenience and anticipated benefits, two factors controlled by the firm, affect RPR. In addition, customer factors, including general privacy concerns, involvement and shopping frequency, affect RPR. Managerially, the results suggest specific actions firms can take to increase the likelihood that consumers engage in relational marketing efforts.

Suggested Citation

  • Ashley, Christy & Noble, Stephanie M. & Donthu, Naveen & Lemon, Katherine N., 2011. "Why customers won't relate: Obstacles to relationship marketing engagement," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 64(7), pages 749-756, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:64:y:2011:i:7:p:749-756
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148-2963(10)00149-9
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Demoulin, Nathalie T.M. & Zidda, Pietro, 2009. "Drivers of Customers’ Adoption and Adoption Timing of a New Loyalty Card in the Grocery Retail Market," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 85(3), pages 391-405.
    2. Gabbott, Mark & Hogg, Gillian, 1999. "Consumer Involvement in Services: A Replication and Extension," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 159-166, October.
    3. Demoulin, Nathalie T.M. & Zidda, Pietro, 2008. "On the impact of loyalty cards on store loyalty: Does the customers’ satisfaction with the reward scheme matter?," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 15(5), pages 386-398.
    4. Jarvis, Cheryl Burke & MacKenzie, Scott B & Podsakoff, Philip M, 2003. "A Critical Review of Construct Indicators and Measurement Model Misspecification in Marketing and Consumer Research," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 30(2), pages 199-218, September.
    5. Morgan, Robert M. & Hunt, Shelby, 1999. "Relationship-Based Competitive Advantage: The Role of Relationship Marketing in Marketing Strategy," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 46(3), pages 281-290, November.
    6. N. Demoulin & P. Zidda, 2008. "On the impact of loyalty cards on store loyalty:does the customers' satisfaction with the reward scheme matter?," Post-Print hal-00285809, HAL.
    7. Goodwin, Cathy & Ross, Ivan, 1992. "Consumer responses to service failures: Influence of procedural and interactional fairness perceptions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 149-163, September.
    8. Smith, Andrew & Sparks, Leigh, 2009. ""It's nice to get a wee treat if you've had a bad week": Consumer motivations in retail loyalty scheme points redemption," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 62(5), pages 542-547, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chen, Yanyan & Mandler, Timo & Meyer-Waarden, Lars, 2021. "Three decades of research on loyalty programs: A literature review and future research agenda," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 179-197.
    2. Danaher, Peter J. & Sajtos, Laszlo & Danaher, Tracey S., 2016. "Does the reward match the effort for loyalty program members?," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 23-31.
    3. García Gómez, Blanca & Gutiérrez Arranz, Ana M & Gutiérrez Cillán, Jesús, 2012. "Drivers of customer likelihood to join grocery retail loyalty programs. An analysis of reward programs and loyalty cards," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 19(5), pages 492-500.
    4. Hu, Xin & He, Liuyi & Liu, Junjun, 2022. "Status reinforcing: Unintended rating bias on online shopping platforms," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    5. Sharma, Dheeraj & Verma, Varsha, 2014. "Psychological and economic considerations of rewards programs," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 21(6), pages 924-932.
    6. Pandit, Ameet & Vilches-Montero, Sonia, 2016. "Are reward cards just a business deal? The role of calculative versus emotional card commitment in driving store loyalty," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 355-360.
    7. Els Breugelmans & Yuping Liu-Thompkins, 2017. "The effect of loyalty program expiration policy on consumer behavior," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 28(4), pages 537-550, December.
    8. Firend Al. R., 2018. "Marketing Strategies of Services and Purchasing Incentives in Asia," GATR Journals jmmr187, Global Academy of Training and Research (GATR) Enterprise.
    9. Arbore, Alessandro & Estes, Zachary, 2013. "Loyalty program structure and consumers' perceptions of status: Feeling special in a grocery store?," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 20(5), pages 439-444.
    10. Zou, Fei & Yang, Mei & Zhou, Yanju & Deng, Yaling & Xie, Baiwei, 2024. "Goal-gradient point rewards can increase consumers' willingness to purchase poverty-alleviating products," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    11. Demoulin, Nathalie T.M. & Zidda, Pietro, 2009. "Drivers of Customers’ Adoption and Adoption Timing of a New Loyalty Card in the Grocery Retail Market," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 85(3), pages 391-405.
    12. Bahri-Ammari, Nedra & Bilgihan, Anil, 2017. "The effects of distributive, procedural, and interactional justice on customer retention: An empirical investigation in the mobile telecom industry in Tunisia," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 89-100.
    13. Steyn, Peter & Pitt, Leyland & Strasheim, Arien & Boshoff, Christo & Abratt, Russell, 2010. "A cross-cultural study of the perceived benefits of a retailer loyalty scheme in Asia," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 355-373.
    14. Chen, Shiuann-Shuoh & Choubey, Bhaskar & Singh, Vinay, 2021. "A neural network based price sensitive recommender model to predict customer choices based on price effect," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    15. Mimouni Chaabane, Aida & Pez, Virginie, 2017. "“Make me feel special†: Are hierarchical loyalty programs a panacea for all brands? The role of brand concept," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 108-117.
    16. Arora, Swapan Deep & Chakraborty, Anirban, 2021. "Intellectual structure of consumer complaining behavior (CCB) research: A bibliometric analysis," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 60-74.
    17. Helgesen, Øyvind & Ivar Håvold, Jon & Nesset, Erik, 2010. "Impacts of store and chain images on the “quality–satisfaction–loyalty process†in petrol retailing," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 17(2), pages 109-118.
    18. Vesel, Patrick & Zabkar, Vesna, 2009. "Managing customer loyalty through the mediating role of satisfaction in the DIY retail loyalty program," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 16(5), pages 396-406.
    19. Filipe, Sandra & Marques, Susana Henriques & Salgueiro, Maria de Fátima, 2017. "Customers' relationship with their grocery store: Direct and moderating effects from store format and loyalty programs," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 78-88.
    20. Ebo Botchway & Jack McLaughlin & Jan Verpooten & Siegfried Dewitte, 2023. "Loyalty Programs in Second-Hand Markets Stimulate Demand but May Interfere With Supply," RAIS Conference Proceedings 2022-2024 0357, Research Association for Interdisciplinary Studies.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:64:y:2011:i:7:p:749-756. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jbusres .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.