"Relationship marketing" has been a buzzword for years, but is it anything more than that? Who really knows what it means? This work aims to provide readers with a complete overview to understanding the concept of customer relationships and how to apply it in today's world of ever-increasing competition. The long-term success of any organization lies in its ability to develop solid, genuine relationships with customers and keep them coming back, and telling their friends, family and associates. Many organizations attempt to implement relationship marketing programmes without first determining what they want that relationship to be and without considering the relationship from the customer's point of view. Many others build programmes on shaky foundations, relying solely on data mining or database marketing to build what in the end are only superficial relationships. The author shows the reader how to put an end to such inadequate approaches. Through experience, Barnes has found that it is not loyalty marketing, frequency marketing or preferred customer plans that constitute a relationship. Instead, an approach is offered that helps managers to understand what the customer means by, and wants in a genuine relationship. He explores the emotional side of the attachment a customer has for a specific company and explains the importance of the strength of that relationship. He offers guidelines for measuring the concepts of value and customer satisfaction and details how those components contribute to the building of long-term relationships.