Relationship Marketing: The Forgotten Consumer
Asma BOUGUERRA, Mohamed Nabil MZOUGHI

Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine the importance of customer relationship proneness in explaining the formation of satisfaction, interpersonal trust, commitment and behavioral intentions. Design/methodology/approach –Hypotheses were tested using Structural equation modeling nearby a sample of 412 Tunisian bank customers. Exploratory and confirmatory tests were performed in order to pre-test the scales used to measure the research variables. Findings – The findings indicate that customer relationship proneness is a psycho-contextual variable. It is an important determinant of satisfaction, interpersonal trust, commitment and behavioral intentions. The long term and affective orientation of the customer is the most important determinant. Research limitations/implications – Limitations of the research are related essentially to the limitation of the study to only the consecutive effects between the components of the relationship. Future researches could test indirect effects, for instance the impact of satisfaction on behavioral intentions. Practical implications – This research shows that Tunisian banks should give more importance to the customer relationship proneness before deciding witch type of marketing to apply: relational or transactional. Originality/value – This paper helps researchers and practitioners to better understand the nature and importance of relationship proneness. This concept is not enough studied in theory and practice. This study is the first to analyze the influence of customer relationship proneness on all the stages of the development of a relationship. These stages are related to each-other and form a “relationship channel”. They have to be studied in a unique model to be completely understood. The interaction between relationship proneness and the total “relationship channel” has never been the object of previous researches.

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