t rather than on marketing, a result of having the relationship between the two backwards. All strategies in an organization should aim toward getting new customers, keeping existing customers, and maintaining a marketing edge in understanding the needs of the customers and what attracts them to one or another product. Putting any other function, including finance, ahead of marketing in an organization is a short-term strategy which cannot ensure the long-term success of the organization.
To this end, Levitt finds that relationships with customers need to be long-term rather than short-term. While this is particularly important with regard to industrial goods and services, it holds true for consumers goods which are purchased frequently. If a company can build a relationship with a customer, that customer is likely to return to purchase additional products. IBM is a prime example of this since, in its early days, it emphasized a close relationship with its customers which extended to IBM becoming a business partner more than just a supplier of computer hardware (Levitt, 1986, p 223).
Levitt also suggests that all products can be differentiated, including those which are typically thought of as commodities. When buying sheet steel, for example, auto manufacturers are not only interested in the quality of the steel, which can be considered a commodity, but also in the price, the delivery options, payment terms, reputation of the supplier, and so on. The same holds true for other types of products typically thought of as commodities, including foodstuffs. There are always, according to Levitt, factors which can be used to differentiate products from one another; that is the challenge to the marketing imagination (Levitt, 1986, p. 77).
Companies which understand the concept of using the marketing imagination are successful. IBM was successful with this approach as it marketed its mainframe computers, but it was unable to t...