Relationship marketing to face with the recession!

My own article

by: TT

In crisis period relationship marketing or one to one marketing can be very useful. Indeed, Relationship Marketing can be defined as direct individualized communication methods to establish individualized and interactive value added relationships with clients on the long term.

A good communication associated with a rich database can allow to:

- increase commitment & trust and exit barriers.

- precise: fine segmentation with precise knowledge about customers which have the most important probability to response (database)
- Increase transactions by client (repurchase behavior, cross selling, up selling)
- Controllable and measurable: Redemption rates

I note that we forget to remind there is some consumers (most of them are rich) which are not really affected by the recession and to leave them aside would be a mistake. That is why some companies rely on the individualization of the relationship and the offer to target these special consumers. This strategy allows to capture and to retain upper class consumer and this in despite of the crisis.

Sure, we can take the example of the Ferrari group is a very good example of this success. Indeed, in the late of 2008 Ferrari has increased its sales by 17, 6 %.( http://www.autoevolution.com/news/ferrari-reports-record-2008-sales-figures-4047.html)

The crisis does not really seem to affect Ferrari and the excitement for the brand is still present. Actually, for years Ferrari has understood that decreasing price is not a good solution for their segment but offering new services or new processes to make business can be a good tool in order to increase the loyalty of the customers. Thus, the “One to One Personalisation Program” has appeared which enables his rich customer to build their own and unique model. This program is essentially for the aesthetics that is to say the colour, interior lining, and for the finishing equipment. Thus luxury, exclusivity of the product in line with the market demands, higher range and niche model can be good weapons against the crisis for Ferrari’s segment.

In one-to-one marketing, the company establishes new relationships with customers by personalizing both his speech and his offer. This strategy enables customer feel recognized and increase their loyalty to the brand. All companies which are targeting upper class should follow the example of Ferrari and continue to maintain a particular relation with their customers through the one-to-one marketing strategy. As we have already said not everyone are affected by the crisis and concentrating efforts on most valued customers’ guarantees revenues and in some extent can be a solution to face with the crisis.