Companies told to be customer centric

To remain relevant, companies need to move from product and segment centric marketing to customer centric marketing was the message from marketing consultant and professor Jagdish Sheth.

Addressing the National Marketing & Media Convention on strategic marketing organised by the Bombay Management Association, Sheth said, it was important for the companies to identify who their most profitable customers were and to try and maximise their relationship with them.

Using the example of Procter & Gamble in the US, Sheth said, the company had identified Wal-Mart as being its largest consumer and then set up a dedicated team to focus on the retailer.

P&G has a dedicated 200-member team and Wal-Mart, 100 member unit to focus solely on their combined business goals. As a result, P&G brand sales at Wal-Mart have gone up drastically.

"As modern retail evolves in India, FMCG companies will need to look at getting similar depth and width with a few select clients in order to maintain customer commitment," said Sheth.

Challenging the notion of customer loyalty, Sheth said that it was important for marketers to look at attaining share of heart over share of wallet.

"Even the most loyal customers defect," he said, using the example of how Kingfisher Airlines had managed to tap in to the upper end, frequent flyer customer base of the other airlines.

The best way of gaining share of heart according to Sheth was to observe consumers when they used the product or service and not when they were buying it.