MIT Sloan Management Review

Management of Technology and Innovation, Marketing

 

The Risks of Customer Intimacy

By Paul Nunes

October 15, 2005

Too much familiarity with customers can backfire, but engaging them in multisided conversations, or "polylogues," can manage the risks and get better results.

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In the past several years, marketers have become enthusiastic about the possibility of establishing personal relationships with their customers. They long for the return to an idealized past, when most transactions were conducted face to face and were closed with a simple handshake. Hoping to recreate this type of customer intimacy — and to capture the loyalty that helped cement many a deal in bygone days — giant firms today talk about engaging customers in dialogue, or having “conversations” with them. To some extent, such thinking is reasonable. Broadcast advertising and take-it-or-leave-it selling propositions — the hallmarks of mass marketing — are losing their power, while technology is making it easier for even very large companies to listen effectively to their customers, to target ever smaller segments and to tailor their offerings.

But let’s face it: Communicating through a Web site with an online retailer is not the same thing as talking with the attentive owner of a local store. Nor is a phone conversation with an unseen customer service rep half a world away conducive to building loyalty, even if “Joe” or “Maria” is on the line trying to explain why your printer won’t print or your cable TV bill this month is larger than your mortgage.

Does that mean companies should give up on “conversing” with the people who buy their products? No, but... To read the complete article, login or sign-up using the form below.

 
 

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