Customerization: The Next Revolution In Mass Customization

Authors: Jerry Wind, Arvind Rangaswamy

A new type of mass customization is redefining marketing and business strategies. Many companies now offer highly customized products in a wide range of categories, including jeans, coffee, dental products, newspapers, vitamins, bicycles, cars, golf clubs, eyeglasses, garden design, and greeting cards. Some companies, such as priceline.com and DealTime.com have customized the price determination process, letting customers specify their own prices, and then try to locate providers who are willing to sell at those prices. Companies, such as Dell, establish custom web sites (called premier pages) for their business customers, whose employees can then order computer configurations that have already been approved by their companies. These are examples of what we call customerization, a redesign of marketing from the customers’ perspective. These companies are doing more than catering to new markets or delivering custom-made products at lower prices; they are transforming the practice of marketing from being seller-centric to being buyer-centric.