How relationship benefits drive customer asset of a firm: a theoretical framework and empirical investigation

In today´s customer-centered era, relationship management is becoming increasingly important, and more firms have transferred their attention from tangible assets towards a new strategic asset-customer asset. Accordingly, relationship benefits have become the focus given that parties in a relationship must benefit for it to continue in the long run. This paper is to identify the key dimension of relationship benefits and examine, by using a disaggregated approach, how they may exert differentiated driving forces on customer asset of a firm. Furthermore, it explores when each dimension of relationship benefits will become even more important by taking a contingent perspective.