Something Approaching Science
Cluster analysis procedures in the CRM era
Agnes NairnUniversity of Bath andPaul BottomleyCardiff University
Introduction
As customer relationship management (CRM) sweeps through global business there is reawakened interest by managers, consultants and academics alike in the classic concept of segmentation. According to a recent PriceWaterhouseCoopers survey (Brown 1999), CRM evolves within a firm in three stages: first, the acquisition of customer data; second, the segmentation of customers into discrete groups; and third, the application of differential relationship management strategies to each identified segment and, in some circumstances, to each individual customer....