Customer Relationship Building on the Internet in B2B Marketing: A Proposed Typology

Despite the large number of customer relationship marketing (CRM) applications currently in use on the Internet, there is a lack of an organizing structure. This paper presents a 3X3 typology of e-CRM practices, with particular focus on business-to-business interactions. The typology is based on two dimensions: (1) the stage of the purchase decision process and (2) Berry and Parasuraman’s (1991) levels of relationship marketing. The proposed typology can be used to design and evaluate a finn’s e-CRM strategies relative to its B2B relationship marketing objectives.