ABSTRACT
Suppose you log on to Dell.com or any other website to buy a product. If it is not a standardized offer (i.e. the same item for each customer, such as a book), then you will have to help build your own product solution, say for a PC, where you can select different combinations of screen, stack, printer, sound, CD/DVD, extra memory, etc. This means that, through a menu selection process online, you have to provide the company with specifications of what you want so that the product can be assembled. Sometimes, when you have finished specifying your requirements and check the price, you realize that it is too expensive – so, then you go a couple of links back and alter some of the selections in your original specification in order to get the best product-price combination that you can afford. This online product-price specification process creates a dialogue between you, the customer, and Dell, the supplier. And dialogue is one of the key characteristics of a marketing relationship (see The role of communications).
Figure 17 Dialogue between supplier and consumer
