In marketing research, two trends mark the development of customer loyalty.

While individual transactions

initially were in the center of marketing research, thefocus shifted towards analyzing relationships

states that the traditional marketingconcep t of the marketing mix with its 4 Ps, developed in the middle of the

lastcentury, had been the established approach until the 1990s. This approach, however,focuses solely on

transactions, a deficit tackled by the relationship marketingapproa ch. At the core of it is the study of relationships

between buyers and sellers