The Power of Personality in CRM
By Mona Srivastava, Janet Parish
2007
Abstract
The idea of corporate reputation has been of interest to academic researchers since the 1950s (Berens and van Riel 2004) because it is a critical determinant of firm success (e.g. Brown, 1998; Fombrun, 1996). Similarly, brand equity has been the focus of considerable research in marketing (Aaker 1991, Keller 1993). However, when consumers speak of brands or firms, we often do not know what they are basing their assessments on. What do they mean by a ‘good’ or a ‘bad’ reputation? (Berens and van Riel 2004). Do they refer to brand equity or corporate reputation? when a firm seeks to build customer relationships, should it be concerned with brand equity (product evaluations) or corporate reputation (firm evaluations)? Furthermore, do these issues matter for assessing relationship quality? We suggest that whether studying brand equity or corporate reputation, a customer-oriented view is critical. Customers base their relationships on what the other person (or firm) is like. We suggest that customers essentially evaluate personality traits such as caring and trustworthiness. We suggest that understanding brand and corporate personalities is also critical for services. We believe that thinking in terms of brand or corporate personalities may be the way that consumers translate corporate-sounding ‘reputation’ descriptors into more human, relationship-oriented terminology and subsequently make relationship decisions and evaluations. The added emotional value of these personality descriptors enhances consumers’ emotional connection to firms.