The Role of Relationship Marketing in Customer Orientation Process in the Banking Industry with focus on Loyalty (Case Study: Banking Industry of Iran)

Abstract

Recently, more than ever before, strong competition, fragmentation of markets, short life cycles of products and increasing customer awareness and complexity, caused companies to use relationship marketing strategy to create, maintain, and enhance strong relationships with their customers to secure their loyalty. This article aimed to empirically investigate the impact of relationship marketing underpinnings (namely trust, commitment, communication, conflict handling, bonding, shared values, empathy, and reciprocity) on customer loyalty in the banking industry. A survey was conducted, collecting data through a questionnaire containing 34 items that was completed by 384 randomly selected bank customers and multiple regression analysis was used for data analysis. The results revealed that the all underpinnings of relationship marketing were directly associated with customer loyalty and they had a significant effect on it. Therefore it is reasonable to conclude that customer loyalty can be created, reinforced and retained by marketing plans aimed at building trust, demonstrating commitment to service, communicating with customers in a timely, reliable and proactive fashion, handling conflict efficiently, paying attention to shared values, improving the empathetic and reciprocal abilities of the salespeople, and developing strong bonds between buyers and sellers.

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