Proposals for innovative and responsible business practices for sustainable energy and social responsibility
As laid out earlier, the European action plans for energy efficiency are important for the environment but also for the national economies (Figure 163).
Although relationship marketing has received much attention in recent years, most of the literature focuses on benefits the firm receives from developing relationships with customers. A comprehensive model explicitly considering both the benefits and barriers of such relationships from the customer’s perspective has not been proposed. To address this gap in the literature, this chapter develops an integrative theory of customers’ motivations to participate in relationships with companies. In particular, the authors review the existing literature on customers’ relational motivations for participating in business exchanges and subsequently present an integrative model of both benefits and barriers to such relationships from a customer perspective. They then report the results of a study examining a portion of the relational benefit side of the model. Finally, implications for the management of relationships with customers are discussed.