Contemporary marketing practice: theoretical propositions and practical implications

Marketing has changed significantly since it first emerged as a distinct business and management phenomenon. We identify some of the major factors causing the observed change in marketing practice. We then describe a classification scheme that is based on transaction marketing and relationship marketing, each of which is characterised using five marketing exchange dimensions and four managerial dimensions. The two general marketing perspectives encompass five distinct types of marketing: transaction marketing, database marketing, e‐marketing, interaction marketing, and network marketing. We consider real‐life (mainly European) companies that have implemented these different marketing approaches. Finally, we deal with the pedagogical contributions including an examination of how it is possible for business schools to teach the subject of marketing from a relationship marketing perspective in such a way that the relevance and quality of teaching and research in relationship marketing is useful to students, faculty, and the business community.