The impact of customer-centric business strategies on customer relationship management: pharmaceutical field-force perspective

Purpose In a modern business scenario, firms have implemented customer-centric approaches to enable customer relationship management (CRM) to trigger business excellence. Business strategies are modernizing business marketing operations that mainly focused on the retention of profitable customers. The purpose of this study is to empirically investigate the impact of marketing strategies (MS), information technology support (IT-S) and knowledge sharing (KS) in the effect of CRM in the pharmaceutical sector of Punjab, Pakistan. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from the field force of national and international pharmaceuticals companies (N = 263) through a convenience sampling technique. Partial least squares structural equation modeling was used to examine data in SmartPLS 3.2.6. Findings The results indicated that IT-S and KS mediate the relationship between MS and CRM. More specifically, MS positively develops CRM through IT-S and KS. Originality/value This research contributes to the existing literature of pharmaceuticals by disclosing the field-force (medical representatives) specific role in developing CRM performance between pharmaceuticals firms and health-care physicians that are mainly based on knowledge advancement and influence these firms to adopt customer-centric business approaches to gain a competitive advantage to drive firm profitability.