Alidu, Abdul-Nasser2017-03-272017-03-272016-10-12https://circumspecte.com/2016/10/african-businesses-wells-fargo-marketing/http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11988/163Author is presently Marketing Director, Ghana Climate Innovation Center, which is based at Ashesi University CollegeWells Fargo is in the news, but for the wrong reasons. The company has been fined US$185 million and more than 5,000 employees have been fired for secretly creating more than 2 million customer accounts without the customers knowing it. Indications are that the woes of the bank are only just beginning. The scandal brewing is a result of the “Gr-eight” Initiative, a cross-sell initiative by the bank which takes advantage of customer loyalty to increase the average number of products held by customers from three to eight. Many of us marketers have caught this loyalty bug at some point in time. As branding and marketing become the order of the day in African businesses and markets, many are buying into the myth of loyalty marketing as a growth strategy. But that’s all it is: a myth with no backbone; growth cannot be achieved through increasing customer loyalty.en-USloyalty marketingWells FargoGhanaconsumer behaviourOther