PurposeIn today's competitive markets where market offerings are far more complicated and customer interfaces are far broader than conventional marketing models assume, marketing has become increasingly tactical and lost control of the customer management process. The purpose of this paper is to develop a promise management‐based approach to marketing with the goal of regaining customer management for marketing.Design/methodology/approachThe approach takes the form of a conceptual analysisFindingsAccording to the promise management approach marketing is viewed as a process of enabling and making promises as well as keeping promises in order to meet expectations created by promises made. Value creation in customer processes is considered the goal for marketing. It is claimed that by taking this view marketing can once again take full responsibility for customer management.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper establishes a foundation for studying marketing as a process in situations where market offerings are multi‐faceted and include inputs from a range of company functions and processes. This is the case in business‐to‐business and service markets.Practical implicationsBy adopting a promise management approach to marketing firms can broaden their understanding of marketing and make use of all aspects of customer management as part of an integrated marketing process.Originality/valueThe paper develops previous discussions in relationship marketing and service marketing of the promise concept and its role in marketing research into a comprehensive marketing framework.