CUSTOMER ORIENTATION AS A BASIC PRINCIPLE IN THE CONTEMPORARY ACTIVITY OF THE BANK

Abstract

An open and sincere orientation towards solving problems and satisfying customer needs is the key used by marketing to open the door to success for any business. There is only one way to create and sustain superior long-term performance by a financial institution: exceptional customer care backed by constant innovation. In fact, banks have adopted the concept of marketing as a utility - the ability to create and retain profitable consumers - and see the customer as the main driving force of their business. Creating customers requires the bank to monitor the business environment in order to react promptly to changes in the needs of existing and potential consumers of financial-banking services, so that they become loyal customers of the institution. In contemporary economic conditions, consumers can choose what, when, how and how often to buy a product. The better the bank's offer synchronizes with the requirements, preferences and desires of consumers, the more loyal they become to the financial institution, willing to use more financial products and services, generating profit for the bank. The strengthening of customer relations becomes even more current in the conditions of the Covid-19 pandemic crisis, arising from the need to maintain a very close contact with customers to ensure good information about changes taking place at the network level, about the measures taken by the bank, about the possibilities of remote banking, etc. This situation forced the banking management to look at things differently, to change certain visions and approaches, because it caused the approach and acceleration of the processes that were foreseen for a more distant future. The main objective of this study is to provide a practical perspective of the customer orientation of the bank activity in order to retain the consumer of financial services and, thus, ensure the viability and stability of its activity.

Keywords

• customer orientation