Marketing Intangibles-Based Competitive Advantage: A Paradigm Shift beyond Traditional Management

Abstract

The paper highlights the increasing interest in the important field of marketing intangibles. Emphasis is made on the concept, mechanisms and importance of the management of such intangibles with a view achieving sustainable competitive advantage. The importance of this topic is manifested in the increasing attention being paid by numerous organizations to fields closely related to intangibles such as Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Customer Long-Life Value (CLLV), Customer Portfolio (CP), etc.
As organizations are competing on the basis of intangibles compared to financial and physical assets, the paper calls upon these organizations to transform the traditional management of marketing tangibles to a management of marketing intangibles, such a new management would be responsible for the enhancement of the utilization of marketing intangibles, thus resulting in the enhancement of the firm’s value and the reduction of the risk. Intangibles should be managed in an innovative way in order to achieve the desired sustainable competitive advantage.