Industrial Marketing Management 52 (2016) 140150

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Industrial Marketing Management

Driving shareholder value with customer asset management: Moving

beyond customer lifetime value
Suvi Nenonen a,b,, Kaj Storbacka b,1
a
b

Hanken School of Economics, Finland

University of Auckland Business School, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142, New Zealand

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 11 June 2014
Received in revised form 17 April 2015
Accepted 19 April 2015
Available online 27 May 2015
Keywords:
Customer asset management
Customer lifetime value
Customer equity
Shareholder value
Customer portfolio

a b s t r a c t
Customer relationships can be conceptualized as market-based assets. Links have been shown between management of these assets and the creation of shareholder value. However, the business-to-business applications of
customer asset management seem to lag behind the applications suggested in a business-to-consumer context.
This occurrence is possibly related to an over-emphasis on customer lifetime value-based approaches that do
not cover the complexities of business-to-business relationships. The authors posit that customer asset management applications should pay attention to all four drivers of shareholder value: revenue, cost, assets, and risk.
Using as their basis a review of literature and the ndings of an empirical research process consisting of three
longitudinal case studies, the authors develop a conceptual framework, identify four research propositions, and
outline 11 ways of managing business-to-business customer relationships for increased shareholder value. The
ndings from the case studies suggest that B2B rms are able to acknowledge all suggested shareholder value
drivers. Findings also suggest that rms should develop customer portfolio models and differentiate their
customer management concepts in order to move customer asset management beyond traditional acquisition
retention optimization.
2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
In their seminal article, Srivastava, Shervani, and Fahey (1998) propose that customer relationships can be conceptualized as marketbased assets. Building on the resource-based view, RVB (Barney, 1991;
Peteraf, 1993; Wernerfelt, 1984), they suggest that the role of marketing
is to create and manage these market-based assets to deliver shareholder
value. Since then, we have seen considerable development in concepts
such as customer lifetime value (CLV), customer equity (CE), and customer equity management (CEM).
CLV as a term can be traced back to Dwyer (1989). The researchers
and commentators who use it most commonly dene it as the present
value of the expected revenues less the costs from a particular customer.
Most existing CLV models have three basic elements: revenue from the
customer, the costs of serving the customer, and customer retention
rate. The earlier, more simplistic CLV models typically evolved to include, for example, sensitivity to cash ows that vary in timing and
amount (Berger & Nasr, 1998; Reinartz & Kumar, 2000), customer

Corresponding author at: University of Auckland Business School, Private Bag 92019,
Auckland 1142, New Zealand. Tel.: +64 9 923 1528.
E-mail addresses: s.nenonen@auckland.ac.nz (S. Nenonen),
k.storbacka@auckland.ac.nz (K. Storbacka).
1
Tel.: +64 9 923 7213.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.indmarman.2015.05.019
0019-8501/ 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

risks (Hogan et al., 2002; Ryals & Knox, 2007), and referral, networking,
and learning potential (Kumar et al., 2010a; Stahl, Matzler, &
Hinterhuber, 2003). The calculation of CLV, in turn, evolved from simple
deterministic models to dynamic models (Lewis, 2015) and advanced
stochastic techniques (Holm, Kumar, & Rohde, 2012).
CE is conceptually tightly linked to CLV, given that it is most commonly dened as the sum of all customers' lifetime values in a customer
base (Schulze, Skiera, and Wiesel, 2012). Various researchers, among
them Kumar and Shah (2009) and Silveira, de Oliveira, and Luce
(2012), show a link between CE and rms' market capitalization, with
Wiesel, Skiera, and Villanueva (2008) thus proposing that customer equity should be included in rms' nancial reporting. Bruhn, Georgi, and
Hadwick (2008), on the other hand, conceptualize CEM as a secondorder construct consisting of activities related to CE analysis, CE strategy
formation, and CE activity management.
However, applications of CVL and CE frameworks reveal two areas
for further research. The rst is associated with the fact that most of
the relevant literature is conceptual in nature (Bruhn et al., 2008;
Persson, 2011), a situation which emphasizes the need for empirical evidence on how rms apply customer equity management in practice.
This research gap is further highlighted by recent concerns about the increasing theorypractice gap in business marketing (Mller & Parvinen,
2015). The second area resides in the realization that current businessto-business (B2B) applications seem to lag, in terms of utility, behind

S. Nenonen, K. Storbacka / Industrial Marketing Management 52 (2016) 140150

the developmental steps made through business-to-consumer (B2C)

applications (Blocker & Flint, 2007; Ramaseshan, Rabbanee, & Hui,
2013).
In this paper, we address these two research gaps through three research objectives: (1) creation of a conceptual framework for managing
B2B customer relationships for increased shareholder value, (2) investigation of how B2B rms manage their customer relationships for increased shareholder value in practice, and (3) synthesis of the ndings
of the empirical research into propositions that can be tested in future
studies.
The structure of the remainder of this paper is as follows. We begin,
in the rst section, with a brief review of the current literature on customer relationships as market-based assets. In the second section, we
describe the conceptual framework. We report on our empirical
research, consisting of three longitudinal B2B case studies, in the third
section, and present the main conclusions of that research in the fourth.
In the nal section, we discuss the theoretical and managerial implications of the research ndings, consider the limitations of the research,
and identify avenues for further research.
2. Driving shareholder value through customer asset management
Our focus in this section is on the current literature on customer
asset management. After considering the potential reasons behind the
lack of CLV applications in the B2B context, we discuss the different
ways in which the customer asset can be managed for increased shareholder value. We then synthesize these drivers of shareholder value into
our proposed conceptual framework.
2.1. From CLV and CEM hegemony to alternative mid-range constructs
Persson and Ryals (2010) suggest that the conceptual confusion
between the constructs of customer equity and customer asset could explain practitioners' slow adoption of customer equity models. In an effort
to clarify these two constructs, these two authors dene customer asset
as a rm's customer relationships to be managed and customer equity as
a measure describing the value of these customer relationships.
Persson and Ryals (2010) clarication suggests that a more fundamental reason, one which relates to the distinction between general
theories and mid-range constructs (cf. Brodie, Saren, & Pels, 2011;
Hunt, 1983), lies behind the identied research gaps. Brodie et al.
(2011) propose that general (or grand) theories are broad conceptions
framed at the highest conceptual level within a disciplinary domain,
while mid-range (or bridging) constructs consider a more limited
scope of phenomena and are more specic in nature. When viewed
from within the context of customer relationships as market-based
assets, RBV can be seen as a general theory, and CLV, CE, and CEM as
mid-range constructs. Because these latter three are mid-range, they
are unlikely to cover all of the theoretical and empirical domains that
position customer relationships as market-based assets, thus necessitating the development of other mid-range constructs in this eld. Accordingly, the general theory of customer relationships as manageable
market-based assets (Srivastava et al., 1998) is likely to leave room for
mid-range constructs other than just CLV and CE.
The current literature provides several viewpoints supporting this
line of reasoning. First, as Persson and Ryals (2010) propose, CLV and
CE are measures of customer asset, but because they are only one set
of several possible measures, they do not exhaust the entire domain of
customer asset management. Second, questions have been raised
about whether CLV can be predicted accurately enough for managerial
purposes (Malthouse & Blattberg, 2005). Third, the lack of empirical
CLV and CE applications in the B2B context implies that these constructs
do not adequately cover this particular empirical domain. Finally, and
most fundamentally, Srivastava et al. (1998) dene shareholder value
creation, not maximization of CE, as the ultimate objective of the management of market-based assets.

141

Even though some researchers consider CE and shareholder value

creation as synonyms or close-enough proxies, there are considerable
differences between these two constructs. As Schulze et al. (2012)
point out, customer equity does not consider, for instance, debt or
non-operating assets, which means it cannot be used as a direct proxy
for shareholder value creation. It is for this reason that we approached
the development of the conceptual framework from the shareholder
value perspective, which led us to ask how can rms manage their customer assets for increased shareholder value in the B2B context?
2.2. Drivers of shareholder value from a customer asset management
perspective
The fact that a rm's shareholders are the people who eventually
judge the rm's nancial performance gives credibility to the argument
that a rm attains optimal nancial performance when it maximizes
long-term shareholder value. Thus, in order to create shareholder
value, a rm needs to generate earnings on invested capital in excess of
the cost of capital adjusted for risk and time (Black, Wright, Bachman,
& Davies, 1998; Rappaport, 1998).
When examining how shareholder value creation can be augmented
by customer asset management, we can express the above denition slightly differently by focusing on the drivers of shareholder
value creation. This focus allows us to divide earnings into its
componentsrevenue and costbecause some customer asset management actions may be targeted to increasing revenues from customers
while others may be aimed specically at decreasing customer-related
costs. On the other hand, we can discuss invested capital and cost of
capital together under a label such as assets because of fewer available
customer asset management actions affecting rms' balance sheets and
capital efciency. Risk is also an appropriate shareholder value driver
when viewed from the customer asset management perspective. Finally,
we can exclude the time component from the present investigation, not
only because it refers to the technical need to discount future cash ows
to their present value, but also because customer asset management
activities do not inuence companies' choice of appropriate discount
rates. Thus, we suggest, the drivers of shareholder value canfrom a
customer asset management perspectivebe divided into four categories: increasing revenues from customers, decreasing customer-related
costs, optimizing asset utilization, and reducing customer-related risks.
We now discuss these four categories in the light of the existing
literature.
2.2.1. Increasing revenues from customers
Customer asset management can help increase revenues by
enlarging the number of customers (customer retention, customer acquisition), augmenting revenues from existing customers (up-sales/
cross-sales, price increases), and ensuring future revenues through
rm renewal and innovation. Most current CLV models focus on customer retention and customer acquisition, and a few papers discuss
the importance of up-sales and cross-sales in maximizing the value of
customer assets (Bolton, Lemon, & Verhoef, 2008; Stahl et al., 2003).
However, only a limited number of customer asset management studies
explicitly discuss the remaining potential ways of increasing revenues
from customers (increasing prices, rm renewal/innovation). Stahl
et al. (2003) present one of the few articles acknowledging that customer bases offer opportunities for targeted price increases and that the
knowledge created within one relationship can yield cash ows in
other contexts as well. Kumar et al. (2010a) and Fang, Palmatier, and
Grewal (2011), however, discuss the role of customers as valuable
knowledge and information sources supporting rms' innovation
efforts.
In addition to the ve above-mentioned revenue drivers, the customer asset management literature widely acknowledges the importance of customer referrals and word-of-mouth in augmenting CLV
(cf Kumar et al., 2010a; Kumar, Petersen, & Leone, 2010b; Villanueva,

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S. Nenonen, K. Storbacka / Industrial Marketing Management 52 (2016) 140150

Yoo, & Hanssens, 2007). Note, though, that we exclude customer referrals and positive word-or-mouth from our conceptual framework, as
these factors do not directly contribute to shareholder value formation.
Referrals and positive word-of-mouth are nevertheless powerful tools
in supporting the identied ve revenue drivers, customer acquisition
in particular.
2.2.2. Decreasing customer-related costs
Customer asset management can also positively affect a rm's costs
by helping it reduce the costs of serving existing customers and acquiring new customers. Berger and Nasr-Bachwati (2001) as well as Pfeifer
(2005) present a CLV model that shows how a xed promotion budget
should be allocated between customer acquisition and customer retention. However, current CLV models establish the costs associated with
individual acquisition and retention activities as xed variables that
cannot be lowered by enhancing rm processes. Also, because these
CLV models tend to focus on allocating promotion budgets, they do
not take into account all of the costs that a rm has to cover in order
to serve its customers. Nevertheless, the majority of B2B customer relationships include activities (and thus costs) beyond just promotional
ones.
Further support for the need to consider non-promotional costs
related to customer relationships comes from evidence showing that
the cost to serve varies considerably from one customer to another
(Helgesen, 2007; Holm et al., 2012; Niraj, Gupta, & Narasimhan,
2001). However, only a limited number of customer asset management
studies explicitly address how rms can reduce relationship costs.
Mittal, Sarkees, and Murshed (2008) examine how rms can lower
costs by moving low-margin high-maintenance customers to cheaper
channels or lower service levels, while Stahl et al. (2003) discuss how
rms can use the experience curve to reduce relationship costs.
2.2.3. Optimizing asset utilization
Firms can use customer asset management to optimize asset utilization in two ways: rst by optimizing the capital invested in customer relationships and then by managing their business volumes for economies
of scale. Rather paradoxically, the current customer asset management
literature shows little interest in studying the link between assets in
the balance sheet and the customer asset: nearly all of the customer
asset management studies limit themselves to exploring the effects of
customer relationships on the prot and loss statement, thereby ignoring the capital employed in managing customer relationships and the
balance sheet effects (an exception is a study by Schulze et al., 2012).
Similarly, studies on how rms can use customer asset management
to achieve optimal asset utilization and economies of scale are rare.
Only a few of the relatively recent customer asset management studies acknowledge the existence of economies of scale and, thus, the
importance of optimal asset utilization. These studies include work
by Johnson and Selnes (2004), Persson and Ryals (2010), and Stahl
et al. (2003).
2.2.4. Reducing customer-related risks
There is a paucity of studies explicitly discussing risks within the
context of customer asset management. Some studies discuss the risks
related to relationship termination through concepts such as customer
lifetime (Reinartz & Kumar, 2000, 2002), protable customer lifetime
or duration (Reinartz & Kumar, 2003), and risk-adjusted customer lifetime value (Ryals, 2003; Ryals & Knox, 2007). The authors of a handful
of studies (e.g., Stahl et al., 2003; Tarasi, Bolton, Hutt, & Walker, 2011)
deliberating the vulnerability and volatility of cash ows, also acknowledge that the value formation for the provider is under risk. However,
we decided to leave these two risk management categoriesreducing
the risks of relationship termination and reducing the risks related to
the value formation for the provideroutside our proposed conceptual
framework because they essentially mirror some previously identied
ways of increasing shareholder value. We consider that reducing the

risks of relationship termination is merely another way of expressing

increasing customer retention and that reducing risks related to the
value formation for the provider can be construed as a summative concept covering all other drivers of shareholder value, that is, increasing
revenues, decreasing costs, and optimizing asset utilization.
It is, however, possible to identify two ways to use customer asset
management to reduce customer-related risks not included in the
previously presented categories. Drawing on the nancial portfolio
theory (Markowitz, 1958; Sharpe, 1964), Dhar and Glazer (2003)
and Hopkinson and Lum (2002) present a concept called customer
beta, which indicates how sensitive the returns from a particular customer are to the overall market movement. Similarly inspired by the nancial portfolio theory, Groening, Yildirim, Mittal, and Tadikamalla
(2014) propose a methodology for developing a customer base that
maximizes return at a given level of risk. These studies make it possible
to derive two ways of increasing shareholder value through customer
asset management: diversifying the customer base and reducing risk
correlations within the customer base.
Diversifying the customer base seeks to limit the provider's dependence on a limited number of large customer relationships whereas reducing risk correlations within the customer base aims to lower the
provider's average risk level by striving for customer relationships that
behave differently under different economic conditions. For example,
customers producing investment goods are often very sensitive to economic cycles whereas customers in FMCG industries can be less cyclical.
Both diversifying the customer base and reducing risk correlations
within the customer base can sometimes involve active termination of
customer relationships (Verhoef & Lemon, 2015).
The above overview of shareholder value literature and customer
asset management literature suggests that customer asset management
can inuence the four shareholder value drivers (revenue, cost, assets,
and risk) in 11 ways. Fig. 1 provides a summary of them.
3. The empirical research process
The empirical research comprised three longitudinal case studies of
rms operating in a B2B context: Alpha in the forest industry,2 Beta in
metals, and Gamma producing and selling beverages for B2B customers.
The research method that the case study research team chose is a
variation of action research. According to Reason and Bradbury (2006,
p. 2), action research is about working toward practical outcomes,
and also about creating new forms of understanding, since action
without reection and understanding is blind, just as theory without action is meaningless. Several features distinguish action research from
other forms of social research: active participation and collaboration between the researchers and the organization, the aim of gaining holistic
and systemic understanding, a focus on change and goals, the use of
multiple types of data-gathering methods, and a systematic dialogue
between action and reection (Coughlan & Coghlan, 2002; Dickens &
Watkins, 1999; Gummesson, 2000).
Because the objective of the present research was to develop novel
mid-range constructs for customer asset management that bridge the
domains of grand theory (RVB, customer relationships as manageable
market-based assets) and empirical reality, our research team deemed
action research to be a suitable research method. Access considerations
also favored this choice. Most rms consider customer asset management to be a highly strategic theme, and therefore rarely freely discuss
it with academic researchers. As Gummesson (2005) notes, one of the
most substantial benets of action research is access to senior managers
and, thus, even to commercially sensitive data.
The research process we used built on the tradition of action research labeled clinical research (see, in this regard, Normann, 1977;
2
It is noteworthy that this paper is a part of a larger research project. We have discussed
case Alpha from a different perspective in a previous publication (Nenonen & Storbacka,
2014).

S. Nenonen, K. Storbacka / Industrial Marketing Management 52 (2016) 140150

143

Fig. 1. Conceptual framework for managing B2B customer relationships for increased shareholder value.

Schein, 1987, 1995). Both Normann and Schein suggest that improvement of the organization is the ultimate test of validity for clinical research. The basic idea is that the generation of good (better) theory
leads to improved health for the organization.
In addition to embracing the principle of dual objectives (practice
and theory), clinical research builds a participatory worldview: research
is done with rather than on people, and all active participants are fully
involved in generating the new knowledge. Hence, we adapted a style
where both the researchers and the informants were active participants
in a social encounter, and where knowledge was constructed collaboratively (Holstein & Gubrium, 1997). Study objectives included not only
generating a new theoretical understanding of customer asset management but also documenting the practical benets that the case rms
experienced when using this form of management. The research furthermore involved close collaboration between the representatives of
the case rms and the research team.
According to Schein (1987, p. 39), clinical research is focused on
problem areas that require remedial action, toward the dynamics
of change and improvement. It is therefore normative in its orientation and requires underlying theories that provide normative
directionconcepts of health, effectiveness, growth, innovation, integration and the like. The clinician's key intervention tool is language
or metaphor development, which he or she uses when endeavoring to
open new aspects of reasoning regarding the specic situation.
The difference between consulting and clinical research is the latter's
regular focus on critical reection and its more deliberate pursuit of
understanding. In accordance with the experience gained from the
interventions (interviews, reporting sessions, workshops, denition
and implementation of new practices, etc.), the researchers spend
time and energy reecting on the tensions between the initial framework (i.e., pre-understanding) and the empirical reality, and between
themselves and the representatives of the client organization. Reection is a non-linear, non-sequential, iterative process of systematic combination directed toward matching theory with reality (Dubois &
Gadde, 2002).
Due to the participatory nature of action research, the research team
used three criteria to select the case study rms. These were accessibility (the rm's willingness to share its customer asset management
practices in detail with the research team), organizational interest
(the rm's willingness to participate in a long, time-consuming action
research process), and t with the research objectives (B2B rms, objective of the action research to improve shareholder value creation
through the management of the customer asset).

Susman and Evered (1978) describe action research as a cyclical process consisting of ve phases: (1) diagnosing (identifying or dening a
problem), (2) action planning (considering alternative courses of action
for solving a problem), (3) action taking (selecting a course of action),
(4) evaluating (studying the consequences of an action), and (5) specifying learning (identifying general ndings).
During the diagnosis phase of the current study, our research team
met one or two times with each rm-specic team, interviewed key individuals in the rms (four interviews with Alpha, three with Beta, and
four with Gamma), and reviewed secondary data provided by the rms.
Attendees at the project team meetings included four to eight representatives of the case rm and three or four members of the research team.
The rst project team meetings focused on clarifying the scope of the research and identifying interviewees and suitable background materials.
The proles of interviewees in all rms were similar: executive vicepresidents and senior managers in general management or management of customer relationships.
The research team conducted all interviews as in-depth nonstructured ones (i.e., without formal interview questionnaires). During
the interviews, the research team asked informants to describe the customer relationship management practices in their rms as well as any
challenges associated with them. All interviews lasted between 70 and
120 min, and at least two members of the research team were present
throughout each interview. The secondary data collected included the
number of customers in the customer base, the data needed to calculate
the prot or economic prot for each customer relationship, descriptions of the rms' customer portfolio or segmentation models, and accounts of the customer asset management activities in use.
During the action-planning phase, the research team and the representatives of each case rm met in several (three to eight) project
meetings, the purpose of which was to design appropriate customer
management concepts. During these meetings, the researchers presented various case studies and alternative frameworks as an input for the
dialogue. These formed the starting points for the rm representatives
and the research team members to engage in group work in order to
develop an appropriate plan.
Because the plan was accepted by the relevant decision-making
bodies in the rms, the rms took the lead in the action-taking phase,
even though the research team remained in close contact with them
during this phase through phone calls, emails, project meetings, and
workshops for the rms' middle management and operative staff. The
close cooperation between representatives of the case rms and the research team was particularly important during the evaluation phase,

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S. Nenonen, K. Storbacka / Industrial Marketing Management 52 (2016) 140150

which included one or two meetings focused on analyzing and

discussing the consequences and also the nancial implications of
implementing the customer-management concepts.
The nal phase of the action research projectspecifying learning
involved three stages. First, the members of the research team and one
or two representatives from each case rm met to identify and discuss
the commonalities across the individual case ndings. The second
wave of learning took place while we, the authors of this current
paper, prepared and wrote the research report. We began the report
process by analyzing the data and observations accumulated during
the earlier research stages through the iterative process of categorization and abstraction that Thomas (1993) describes. Each of us independently reviewed the case study data and the proposed categorization of
customer asset management actions set down in the framework in
Fig. 1. We then worked together, comparing and discussing the cases
and their ndings dispassionately and debating whether and how
each data item contributed to overall learning. Finally, key representatives of the case rms gave feedback about the proposed framework
and its constituent parts. This process of member checks increased the
trustworthiness of our qualitative results (Lincoln & Guba, 1985).
4. Findings from the case studies
In the rst part of this section, we provide information about the nature of each case rm, how the action research played out in it, and what
the learning from that process meant for each rm. In the second part,
we draw together and discuss the empirical ndings from this information, exploring them within the context of the conceptual framework
presented in Fig. 1.
4.1. Case 1: Alpha (forestry products)
Alpha is a division of a global forestry product corporation,
headquartered in Europe. Alpha operates in an industry characterized
by a limited number of long-term customer relationships. The case
study data collection period therefore covered two years, designated
Analysis Year 1 and Analysis Year 2. During the rst year, Alpha had
76 active customer relationships. During the second year, the rm's customer base consisted of 78 customers.
In order to direct its customer asset management activities, Alpha
elected to use a form of cumulative economic prot contribution analysis to analyze its customer base. During this process, Alpha rst calculated the customer-level prots by deducting the customer-specic costs
from the customer-specic turnover. It then allocated the general
costs to the different customers based on their business volumes.
Next, Alpha allocated all of its assets to the different customers, with
the allocation based partially on the customers' actual asset utilization
and partially on their business volumes. Finally, Alpha calculated the
customer-specic economic prot by subtracting the capital charges
for that part of the rm's assets allocated to the customer relationship
in question from the customer-specic prot.
Alpha used the ndings from this analysis to create three customer
portfolios. Portfolio A contained the 13 customers who generated the
highest economic prot for Alpha during Analysis Year 1. Portfolio C
contained the 11 customers who generated negative economic prot
during Analysis Year 1. Portfolio B contained the 52 customers positioned between these two portfolios, that is, with close to zero economic
prot during Analysis Year 1.
Closer portfolio-level analysis revealed that the customer relationships in Portfolio A were characterized by substantial business volumes
in addition to considerable positive economic prots. Portfolio B, with
customer relationships characterized by close to zero economic protability, contained a much larger number of individual customer relationships than the other two customer portfolios. Most customer
relationships in Portfolio C had large business volumes despite these
customer relationships having negative economic protability.

Based on this information, Alpha created three differentiated customer management concepts for the customer portfolios in order to
maximize shareholder value creation. For Portfolio A, the rm crafted
a concept it called margin and cash ow maintenance. Alpha's aim here
was, as the concept name suggests, to secure and potentially increase
the margin and cash ow from these large-volume, economically profitable customer relationships. In practice, Alpha not only gave its Portfolio A customers access to the rm's entire regular product range but also
offered them the option of tailor-made products. Alpha also ensured
that the orderdelivery process for Portfolio A customers involved a sophisticated supply-chain management solution and that its pricing policy encompassed 12-month agreements.
The Portfolio A customers additionally received access to a wide
range of technical support services: customized on-site support, regular
technical meetings, technical manager visits, quality reports, and standard certications. Finally, Alpha used various activities to manage its
relationships with its Portfolio A customers. These activities included
annual meetings with customers, regular visits by Alpha personnel at
the vice-president level, regular visits by Alpha's sales manager and
sales representatives, visits to each customer's various work sites, and
continuous customer planning.
Alpha called the concept that it developed to guide its relationships
with its Portfolio B customers, risk management. The objective of this
concept was to reduce Alpha's overall business risks by reducing the interdependencies in the customer base and by using the small-volume
customer relationships as a buffer against business-cycle variations.
Due to their lesser contribution to Alpha's economic protability, customers in Portfolio B received a less extensive service than customers
in Portfolio A. Customers in Portfolio B, however, did have access to
Alpha's top 20 products, priced according to three-month contracts.
Alpha managed the orderdelivery process for these customers through
direct orders and its local sales ofces. The rm also provided these customers with several technical support services: emergency on-site support, technical manager visits, quality reports (when appropriate), and
standards certications. Alpha limited its relationshipmanagement activities to sales manager and sales representative visits, and only made
such visits when it deemed it appropriate to do so.
The concept that Alpha developed for its Portfolio C customers was
capacity optimization, the objective of which was twofold: to consolidate
the range of products offered to these customers, and to bring in capacity use of Alpha's production facilities so as to decrease the rm's xed
and capital costs per production unit. The products offered were Alpha's
top 10. The Portfolio C concept reected Alpha's understanding that
even though its Portfolio C customers were generating negative economic prot, the product volume secured through these relationships
was still important.
Alpha accepted only direct orders for the top 10 products from its
Portfolio C customers, and it priced these products according to market
price. Alpha limited the technical support that it offered these customers to emergency on-site support, quality reports when appropriate,
and standards certications. Alpha also kept its relationship management activities directed toward Portfolio C customers to a minimum.
It thus provided these customers only with up-to-date information on
the roles and responsibilities of Alpha's personnel, and rarely encouraged site visits.
During the analysis period,3 Portfolio A customers' economic prot
contribution increased from 2,665,861 to 2,821,984 per annum, and
the negative economic prot contribution of Portfolio C customers declined from 1,467,725 to 1,352,254. However, the Portfolio B

3
When assessing the impact of the action research interventions to the nancial performance of Alpha, Beta and Gamma, keep in mind that it is not possible to separate the effect
of the action research from the other factors such as case companies' other concurrent
business development activities and changes in the overall operating environment. The nancial performance of the case companies before and after the action research interventions are, however, disclosed to provide maximum transparency to the empirical material.

S. Nenonen, K. Storbacka / Industrial Marketing Management 52 (2016) 140150

customers' economic prot contribution decreased during the analysis

period from 1,239,038 to 874,854, leading to a reduction in Alpha's
overall economic prot contribution (2,437,174 to 2,334,584).
This reduction in the total economic prot needs to be placed in context. During the analysis period, the external operating environment for
Alpha worsened rapidly. The entire forestry sector experienced a severe
downturn, and the average price of forestry products dropped considerably. The decrease in the overall economic prot generated by Alpha's
customer base therefore was probably, at least in part, an outcome of
external factors and not Alpha's own actions.
4.2. Case 2: Beta (metals)
Beta is a division of a global metal products corporation, headquartered in Europe. The analysis period for Beta covered one and a
half years. Beta's customer base is slightly less concentrated than
Alpha's. During Analysis Year 1, the rm had 256 active customer relationships, and during the rst half of Analysis Year 2, it had 222 customer relationships.
The starting point for Beta's customer asset management activities
was creation of a customer portfolio model. This process had two
dimensionseconomic prot and the strategic t of customer relationships. Beta used four parameters to assess the latter: relationship
strength, customer relationship value potential, reference value, and
current production t. The rm then divided these four strategic-t
parameters into multiple constituents in order to aid assessment of its
customer relationships.
Relationship strength accordingly encompassed Beta's share of
wallet, length of contracts, length of relationships, customer participation in special customer programs, and level of customer contacts.
Customer relationship value potential focused on customer growth rate
and the possibilities of differentiating offerings for the customer, creating a partnership with the customer, and increasing revenue and/or
prots from the customer relationship in the future. Reference value
drew on Beta's reputation among its customers and the extent to
which each customer could serve as a promotional case in Beta's marketing materials. Finally, current production t referenced production
and product-line utilization.
Beta next used the information on its customers' economic prot
and strategic t to create four portfolios. The renewal portfolio
contained customers providing positive economic prot and with a
high strategic t. Although cash ow customers also had positive
economic-prot value for Beta, they had low strategic t. Customers in
the capacity portfolio had negative economic prot and high strategic
t. Monitor customers yielded negative economic prot and had low
strategic t. Interestingly, Beta dened three differentiated customer
management concepts based on the customer portfolio information:
one concept for the renewal and cash ow customers (i.e., customers
with positive economic prot), one concept for the capacity and monitor
customers (i.e., customers with negative economic prot), and one
concept for those customers whose customer portfolio status required
Beta to substantially change the way it was managing the customer
relationship.
The name that Beta gave the customer management concept associated with its renewal and cash ow customers was partnership. For
Beta, this concept meant providing the relevant customers with the
following:
All of the rm's products;
All available strategic services (common strategy development, value
chain optimization, third-party collaboration);
All available business support services (enterprise resource integration, common business plan, risk management, order-input web
application);
All available sales and marketing services (training, technical marketing support); and

145

All available application engineering, production, and logistics

services (process optimization, design support, product optimization,
logistics optimization, prioritized deliveries, scrap management, and
customer-specic mill certicate).

In line with its partnership concept, Beta also set up a nominated

account team for each customer. The teams used a full-scale account
management process and worked to the precepts of Beta's partnership
business plan. The teams elicited customer satisfaction ratings through
relationship reviews and satisfaction questionnaires.
Beta directed its second customer management concept, product, toward its capacity and monitor customers. Beta provided these customers with all of its productssimilar to the approach commensurate
with the partnership concept. However, the product concept markedly
limited these customers' access to Beta's services: only two business
support services (risk management and order-input web application),
and only two application engineering, production, and logistics services
(scrap management and the customer-specic mill certicate). In addition, Beta's customer relationship management activities within the
product concept category were less extensive than those within the
partnership category. Beta accorded its product-based customers a
nominated sales representative, limited the relationship management
process to daily sales and delivery encounters, conducted customer
relationship planning through contact management and sales followup, and obtained customer satisfaction ratings through a satisfaction
questionnaire.
For Beta, the third customer management concept, solution, was
transitory in nature because it enabled the rm to move its relationships
with customers generating negative economic prot from under the
partnership concept to a product concept based on customers' portfolio
status (either capacity or monitor). Like the partnership and product
customers, solution-concept customers could access all of Beta's products. They could also access all of the same business support services,
sales and marketing services, and application engineering, production,
and logistics services as the partnership customers could. However,
they did not receive Beta's strategic services, and their customer relationship management was slightly more limited than that provided
under the partnership concept. Beta appointed a named account manager (who worked to a basic account management process and solution
business plan) to each of its solution customers, and used questionnaires to elicit satisfaction data from these customers.
During the 18-month analysis period, Beta considerably increased
its economic prot. During the rst 12 months after Beta began
implementing the differentiated concepts, the rm made an economic
prot of 1,549,685. During the next six months, Beta made an economic prot of 1,567,521, giving a forecast economic prot growth rate of
over 100% for the entire scal year. However, when assessing the impact
of the customer asset management activities on the improved nancial
result, one needs to take into account that Beta initiated a process efciency program in parallel with its customer management concept
differentiation.
4.3. Case 3: Gamma (beverages)
Gamma, a division of a European beverage rm, is responsible for
beverage sales to B2B customers such as restaurants, hotels, bars, nightclubs, and cafeterias. During the analysis period, which covered four
years, Gamma had a customer base of approximately 4000.
Gamma decided to analyze its customer base by using six different
criteria illustrating the value of customer relationships. These were
turnover, sales margin, EBIT (earnings before interest and taxes), sales
volume in liters, assessment by one of Gamma's sales representatives,
and assessment by the relevant area manager. The sales representative
and area manager assessments focused on the evident potential and the
risks involved in the customer relationship.

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Gamma used the information obtained from the analysis to create

three customer portfolios. The rst, Portfolio A, consisted of customers
with the highest customer relationship value scores (top 10% of the customer base), Portfolio B of the next 25%, and Portfolio C of the remaining
65%. Gamma also created a fourth customer portfolio that it labeled
must. The 25 must customers were those that Gamma deemed crucial
for building the rm's brand, those for whom Gamma had made considerable investments in the customer's premises, and those with a strong
link to a Gamma-sponsored target. Gamma created individual customer
management concepts for each of these four portfolios. The portfolios
differed from one another in terms of customer visits, availability, and
pricing of services, promotions, and marketing materials.
For must customers, Gamma dened three different customer visits:
analysis visits, focused on analyzing the customer's situation, sales
visits, aimed mainly at presenting new products and adjusting the
customer's current product range, and social calls, directed toward
managing the softer side of customer relationships. Each must customer received 12 or 18 customer visits per year: 18 if the customer
did not belong to a hotel or restaurant chain and 12 if the customer
was part of a chain.
In addition to supplying beverages, Gamma provides its customers
with a range of other servicespromotional, training, sales planning,
category planning, equipment, analysis, information, and installation.
Must customers received these services free of charge. Gamma also
assigned considerable effort to planning promotions and events in
cooperation with must customers. Finally, must customers gained unlimited access to all of Gamma's marketing materials.
Gamma visited its Portfolio A customers 12 times a year. However,
the rm limited these visits to analysis visits and sales visits; social
calls were forbidden. The latter proviso was the main feature differentiating Portfolio A customers from must customers, given that both sets of
customers had equal (gratis) access to the same services and promotion
cooperation and marketing materials.
The concept associated with managing Gamma's Portfolio B translated into a relatively streamlined process. Gamma visited the non-chain
customers in Portfolio B nine times a year, but limited these visits to
analysis and sales purposes. Portfolio B customers who were members
of a chain experienced six visits annually. All of these visits were basic
in nature, which meant they were not distinguished by nature or content. As such, customer meetings involved the same basic agenda,
which covered all aspects of relationship management from situation
analysis to presentation of new products. While Portfolio B customers
could access Gamma's entire range of services, they had to pay for
each service used. Gamma provided some promotion planning cooperation for customers in Portfolio B, but these customers had more limited
access than the other two sets of customers to Gamma's marketing
materials.
Gamma grouped its Portfolio C customers, the majority of whom
generated a loss for Gamma during Analysis Year 1, on the basis of the
rm's most limited concept. These customers received a visit from
Gamma two or three times a year, depending on whether or not they
belonged to a chain. The visits were basic in nature. Portfolio C
customers had no access to Gamma's services other than equipment
servicing, which is crucial for ensuring that the basic operations of distributing and selling beverages proceed smoothly. Furthermore,
Gamma required these customers to pay for any servicing that they
used and all these services were priced individually. Finally, Gamma
provided its Portfolio C customers with very limited promotion planning cooperation and limited access to marketing materials.
During the four-year analysis period, Gamma increased its prots
considerably. By the end of Analysis Year 1, Gamma had made an EBIT
of 4,000,000. By the end of Analysis Year 4, Gamma's EBIT stood at
21,500,000. However, there is no certainty that the improvements
were due to successful customer relationship management, although
it doubtless had a substantial impact. During the analysis period,
Gamma also developed the way it communicated its offering to its

B2B customers. These simultaneous development efforts would have

also inuenced the improvement in EBIT.
4.4. Summary
Table 1 provides a summary of the empirical ndings from the three
case studies. Comparison of the ndings with the 11 ways of increasing
shareholder value through customer asset management illustrated in
the conceptual framework (Fig. 1) makes clear that different customer
asset management activities attracted different emphases across the
empirical data.
First, all case rms used customer asset management for targeted
customer retention. They sought to identity the most valuable customer
relationships and to serve these customers with high-involvement customer management concepts. All three rms also had dened, extensive
offerings for their most valuable customers, with the specic intent of
increasing up-sales and cross-sales. Both Alpha and Gamma employed
targeted price increases or differentiated pricing. Alpha differentiated its
contract lengths and thus different price levels in accordance with its
different customer management concepts. Similarly, Gamma differentiated the pricing of its services, offering services free of charge to its most
valuable customers and charging its less valuable ones. Beta was the
only rm to acknowledge the importance of customer asset management for rm renewal (innovation) for future revenues. Beta assessed
customer relationship value potential when analyzing the strategic t
of the customer relationship, and based one of its customer portfolios
on the notion of renewal.
Reducing cost to serve was strongly present: all rms differentiated
their customer management concepts in order to minimize the cost to
serve associated with their low-involvement concepts. However, it is
especially interesting to observe that all three case rms completely
overlooked both customer acquisition and reducing cost to acquire in
their customer asset management activities. The reasons behind this
nding are debatable. On the one hand, all analyzed rms were operating in a B2B context with a limited number of potential customer relationships and long-term contracts. Therefore, these rms may have
seen customer acquisition as a less important aspect of customer asset
management. On the other hand, all case study rms acquired some
new customer relationships during the investigation period, indicating
the presence of some customer acquisition activities. However, all the
rms decided not to include these activities in their customer asset
management processes, as they deemed these activities too operational
and/or ad hoc. The limited importance of customer acquisition in customer asset management evident in the case study ndings supports
Blocker and Flint's (2007) argument that rms need to use different customer asset management models in B2B and B2C contexts.
Optimizing capital invested in customer relationships also received
very little attention in the analyzed customer asset management
models. Alpha and Beta both calculated the economic prot generated by individual customer relationships. In order to calculate the
customer-specic economic prot, both rms allocated their capital
costs to individual customer relationships. However, neither Alpha nor
Beta considered capital investments in their differentiated customer
management concepts.
Business volumes/economies of scale as a means of increasing shareholder value through customer asset management can be detected in
the Alpha and Gamma ndings. Alpha created a capacity optimization
concept for large-volume but unprotable customer relationships in
order to ensure even business volumes over time and thus optimal utilization of production facilities. When assessing the overall value of its
customer relationships, Gamma considered customers' business volumes in terms of liters of beverage. Nevertheless, in both rms, aspects
related to asset utilization were not as well represented as aspects related to revenues and P&L costs.
The predominance of P&L items over balance sheet items in
the existing customer asset management literature could offer one

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147

Table 1
Summary of case ndings.

Industry
Customer base size
Customer portfolio model
Portfolio model dimensions

Alpha

Beta

Gamma

Forestry products
Approx. 80 customer relationships
Yes

Metal
Approx. 225 customer relationships
Yes
Two-dimensional
1. Economic prot
2. Strategic t of customer relationships (index
of 16 constituents)
All customer revenues (used to calculate
economic prot); future value potential
All P&L costs (used to calculate economic prot)

Beverage
Approx. 4000 customer relationships
Yes
One-dimensional
1. Value of customer relationships
(index of 6 constituents)

Revenue aspects of portfolio

model
Cost aspects of portfolio model

All customer revenues (used to

calculate economic prot)
All P&L costs (used to calculate
economic prot)
Asset aspects of portfolio model Capital costs associated with assets
(used to calculate economic prot)
Risk aspects of portfolio model N/A.
Customer management
Three differentiated customer
concepts
management concepts for different
portfolios:

Differentiation of customer
management concepts

Margin and cash ow maintenance:

for customers with highest economic prot
Risk management: for customers
with moderate economic prot
Capacity optimization: for customers with negative economic
prot.
Differentiation of:

Product range
Pricing
Order-to-delivery process
Technical support
Relationship management
activities

Turnover, sales margin, EBIT, sales representative

and area manager assessments
Costs to calculate sales margin and EBIT

Capital costs associated with assets (used to

calculate economic prot)
N/A
Three differentiated customer management
concepts; exible link to portfolios:

Sales representative and area manager assessments

Four differentiated customer management
concepts for different portfolios:

Partnership: as target strategy for customers

with high economic prot
Solution: as transitory strategy for those customer relationships which the rm seeks to
move from one strategy to another
Product: as target strategy for customers with
low economic prot.

Must: for customers that are crucial for the brand

and visibility
A: for customers with highest relationship value
scores
B: for customers with moderate relationship
value scores
C: for customers with low relationship value scores

Differentiation of:

Differentiation of:

Service offering
Relationship management resources
Relationship management process and
planning
Satisfaction follow-up

explanation for this phenomenon. Another reason could reside with the
fact that production and other asset-intensive functions traditionally
have barely interacted with the functions and processes involved in
managing customer relationships. This situation is not surprising
given that customer asset management has its roots within marketing
literature and therefore within marketing functions. However, if the
aim of customer asset management is to increase shareholder value
creation, it seems obvious that customer management models should
also acknowledge balance sheets and optimal asset utilization.
Similar to the situation with asset utilization, reducing customerrelated risks was a relatively rare occurrence in the analyzed customer
asset management models. Only one of the rms, Gamma, used riskrelated measures when developing their customer portfolio model. In
similar vein, only Alpha used its customer management concepts to
purposefully diversify the customer base and to reduce risk correlations
within the customer base. Alpha aligned its risk management concept
to the rm's objective of moderating the interdependencies in its customer base and using customer relationships with smaller volumes as
buffers against variations in the business cycle.
One possible explanation for the relative scarcity of activities
targeted to managing customer-related risks can be found in the current
customer asset management literature. As we discussed previously, the
extant literature typically uses the concept of risk to refer to risks of relationship termination, but we eliminated this concept from the proposed conceptual framework in order to avoid overlaps with customer
retention. Anecdotally, all three rms used their customer management
concepts to reduce the risks of relationship termination by offering
high-involvement concepts and long-term contracts to their most valuable customers. The customer base level considerations of customerrelated risk that are included in the proposed conceptual framework
are not, however, as established in the current literature, and this fact
may explain their paucity in the empirical material. Therefore, the ndings suggest that all three case rms had the potential to advance their
use of customer asset management as a risk management tool.

Volume in liters

Customer visits
Availability and pricing of services
Promotions
Marketing materials

5. Conclusions
Drawing on the ndings of the empirical research, we posit four research propositions for managing B2B customer relationships for
increased shareholder value. First, the evidence from the three case
rms concurs with the proposed conceptual framework (Fig. 1) and indicates that B2B rms are able to acknowledge all four drivers of shareholder value (revenue, cost, assets, risks) in relation to their customer
asset management activities. However, it is likely that the relative importance of the four drivers varies depending on the rm's industry
and overall strategy. Because of this variation, different rms are likely
to incorporate divergent combinations of the identied 11 ways to increase shareholder value through customer asset management in their
customer asset management concepts. Thus:
P1. In B2B contexts, customer assets can be managed for improved shareholder value by increasing revenues generated by customer relationships,
reducing costs related to customer relationships, optimizing the use of
assets associated to customer relationships, and reducing risks related to
customer relationships.
Even though the majority of the existing customer asset management frameworks rely on CLV or CE as their primary indicator, the
empirical data implies that B2B rms, when designing or monitoring
customer asset management activities, are not eager to use such
forward-looking measures as their key performance indicators. This reluctance might be explained by the fact that B2B customer relationships
can be very long-standing (relationships of 100-plus years are not uncommon) and often foster considerable business volumes (many B2B
rms can have up to 2040% of their total turnover coming from a single
customer relationship). In a context such as this, the estimation challenges associated with CLV and CE calculations (cf. Malthouse &
Blattberg, 2005) can be unmanageable, increasing the appeal of the
more traditional retrospective nancial measures. Hence:

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P2. Due to large volume and long-term customer relationships, B2B rms
are more likely to rely on retrospective indicators (such as protability or
economic protability) than on prospective indicators (such as CLV or
CE) to guide their customer asset management activities.
Ever since publication of the foundational works (cf. Berger &
Nasr-Bachwati, 2001; Blattberg & Deighton, 1996), the existing literature has emphasized customer acquisition and customer retention as
the central tenets of customer asset management frameworks. However, the evidence from the case studies indicates that, in practice, B2B
rms use a much larger array of customer asset management activities
in order to improve the shareholder value creation from the customer
asset. Furthermore, none of the three case study rms decided to include customer acquisition as an element in their customer asset management concepts. This decision could be attributed to the fact that
many B2B rms have only a limited number of potential customer relationships to target, with these potential customers often contractually
bound through long-term agreements to their current providers. Thus:
P3. Those B2B rms that have a limited number of current and potential
customer relationships are likely to opt for a wider range of customer
asset management activities than for customer acquisitionretention
optimization.
Kumar and George (2007) conceptualize that rms can design their
customer asset management activities on three levels: customer base
(i.e., having one concept that is applied to all customer relationships),
individual customer (i.e., having different concepts for all customer
relationships), and customer segment/portfolio (i.e., having different
concepts for different customer segments or portfolios). The extant academic accounts on how rms conduct their customer asset management in practice are scarce, but the evidence from the three case rms
suggests that portfolio or segment level models are seen as viable alternatives due to their ability to balance cost-efciency with customeroriented differentiation. Hence:
P4. In order to balance differentiation and cost-efciency, B2B rms are
likely to use portfolio- or segment-level models rather than customer- or
customer-base-level models to guide their customer asset management
activities.
To conclude, these four research propositions can also be seen as a
foundation for a tentative mid-range construct for managing B2B
customer relationships as market-based assets, thereby providing an
alternative to the prevailing CLV and CE models. Table 2 juxtaposes
this emerging mid-range concept (i.e., customer portfolios) with CLV
models.
5.1. Theoretical implications
The empirical ndings of this study suggest several implications for
theoretical-based discussion on customer asset management. First, the
ndings suggest that rms can and do use customer asset management
as a link between shareholder value formation and marketing (see

also Gupta & Lehmann, 2003; Rust, Lemon, & Zeithaml, 2004; Stahl
et al., 2003).
Second, by building on Brodie et al.'s (2011) distinction between
general theories and mid-range constructs, the present study has developed an alternative perspective to managing customer assets as marketbased assets to the dominant CLV and CE models. The starting point for
this development is Srivastava et al.'s (1998) proposition that shareholder value creation is the ultimate objective of the management of
market-based assets and Schulze et al.'s (2012) conclusion that CLV
and CE cannot be used as direct proxies for shareholder value creation.
Our research posits customer portfolios as a tentative new mid-range
construct for managing B2B customer relationships as market-based
assets.
Third, the ndings emphasize the importance of differentiating
segment- or portfolio-level customer management concepts in
order to move customer asset management beyond acquisition retention optimization. In this respect, the conclusions of the present
study build a bridge to the relationship portfolio literature in industrial marketing and purchasing (see, for example, Corsaro, Fiocca,
Henneberg, & Tunisini, 2013; Mitrega & Pfajfar, 2015; Ritter & Andersen, 2014). As yet, the literatures on customer asset management
and relationship portfolios have developed mostly separately from
each other. However, our study suggests that deeper integration of
these two literature streams could considerably increase understanding
of managing B2B customer relationships for increased shareholder
value.
Fourth, our study deepens the existing knowledge of value creation
in relationships (see, for example, Lepak, Smith, & Taylor, 2007; Mller
& Trrnen, 2003; Ulaga, 2003; Walter, Ritter, & Gemnden, 2001), especially with respect to nancial value capture for the provider.
5.2. Avenues for further research
As is the case with all research, our approach has its limitations.
However, these constitute interesting avenues for further research.
First, the empirical scopein terms of industries, geographies, and company sizeis limited. Hence, the presented four research propositions
for managing B2B customer relationships for increased shareholder
need to be further explored by subjecting them to additional empirical
scrutiny in various B2B contexts.
Second, although our study was longitudinal in nature, it became
evident during the research process that increasing shareholder value
by actively managing customers as assets is a truly long-term process.
Accordingly, there is a need for more research wherein the implementation of customer asset management activities is followed over time,
preferably a time that extends beyond normal industrial cycles. This approach would make it possible to address the impact of external factors
such as competition and industry development on customer asset management. Studies that simultaneously investigate rms' attempts to
manage their customer assets and the resulting responses from the customers, competitors, and other relevant actors would be a very valuable
contribution to this eld of research.

Table 2
Comparison of CLV and portfolio models.

Main analytical tool

Managerial aim

Managerial repertoire

Examples of suitable empirical contexts

Customer lifetime value (CLV)

Customer portfolios

Formula to calculate CLV; arriving at a numerical value

for each customer
Mathematical optimization: allocating (marketing)
resources to maximize
CLV / CE
Initially promotion budget allocation; now all aspects
of marketing mix

Segmentation model, categorizing customers on how valuable they

are for the provider (value capture)
Support for managerial decision-making: helping to differentiate
customer management concepts for increased shareholder value

B2C, asset-light companies, companies with large

customer bases

Eleven ways to increase shareholder value from customers by

increasing revenues, decreasing costs, optimizing asset utilization,
and reducing risks
B2B, asset-heavy companies, companies with smaller customer bases

S. Nenonen, K. Storbacka / Industrial Marketing Management 52 (2016) 140150

Third, the review of current customer asset management literature

reveals the need for more research in the areas of risk management
and asset optimization. The concepts of customer base diversication,
risk correlations in the customer base, and capital employed in the customer relationships receive particularly limited attention in the current
literature.
Finally, although the proposed conceptual framework for managing
customer relationships for increased shareholder value creation was
developed for B2B rms in particular, it could be developed further to
accommodate B2C rms as well.
5.3 . Managerial implications
This study opens interesting opportunities for managers in B2B
rms. Because the majority of current customer asset management
models are based on CLV calculations and customer acquisition
retention spending optimization, they have limited application potential in B2B contexts. Customer portfolios, however, seem to be a
suitable way of operationalizing customer asset management in
B2B rms.
The study also illustrates various ways that rms can differentiate
customer management concepts in order to actualize customer asset
management decisions. Managers in B2B rms can use the proposed
11 methods as a means of ensuring that they address all main drivers
of shareholder value creation (revenue, cost, assets, risk) through customer asset management. Managers need not, of course, use all 11
methods listed but rather select those that best suit their rms' needs
and business models.
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