“Running is my boyfriend”: consumers’ relationships with activities

What is it about?

The paper introduces the idea that consumers can maintain long-lasting relationships with their own activities. In the paper, running is used as an example: People's relationships with the activity of running contain both emotion and meaning, they come in multiple forms and change over time, and can even be considered reciprocal, to some extent. Thus, the relationship metaphor is applicable to the link between consumers and activities.

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Photo by Emma Simpson on Unsplash

Photo by Emma Simpson on Unsplash

Why is it important?

The paper introduces a completely new perspective to consumer marketing: A focus on consumers' personal relationships with their own activities. This is captured in the concept of consumers' "activity-relationships" which is introduced in the paper. This also makes a new type of marketing possible, "customer activity-relationship marketing", which focuses on supporting consumers' relationships with desired activities.

Perspectives