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Concept
Customer
Summary
In sales, commerce, and economics, a customer (sometimes known as a client, buyer, or purchaser) is the recipient of a good, service, product or an idea - obtained from a seller, vendor, or supplier via a financial transaction or exchange for money or some other valuable consideration.
Early societies relied on a gift economy based on favours. Later, as commerce developed, less permanent human relations were formed, depending more on transitory needs rather than enduring social desires. Customers are generally said to be the purchasers of goods and services, while clients are those who receive personalized advice and solutions. Although such distinctions have no contemporary semantic weight, agencies such as law firms, film studios, and health care providers tend to prefer client, while grocery stores, banks, and restaurants tend to prefer customer instead.
The term client is derived from Latin clients or care meaning "to incline" or "to bend", and is related to the emotive idea of closure. It is widely believed that people only change their habits when motivated by greed and fear. Winning a client is, therefore, a singular event, which is why professional specialists who deal with particular problems tend to attract long-term clients rather than regular customers. Unlike regular customers, who buy merely on price and value, long-term clients buy on experience and trust.
Clients who habitually return to a seller develop customs that allow for regular, sustained commerce that allows the seller to develop statistical models to optimize production processes (which change the nature or form of goods or services) and supply chains (which change the location or formalize the changes of ownership or entitlement transactions).
An "end customer" denotes the person at the end of a supply chain who ultimately purchases or utilised the goods or services.
A client paying for construction work is often referred to as an "employer".
Official source
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