UNIT 1I

Key Dimensions of Services Marketing: Introduction- Service Environment- Service Blue Printing-
Service Encounter- Customer Expectations- Demand- Supply Management- Service Quality- Service
Quality Gap- Service Quality Audit-Delivering Quality Services Communication Strategies- Bench
Marking-TQM-Customer Satisfaction Measurement Techniques- MPQ-ROQ- Service Guarantees.

SERVICE BLUEPRINTING

A blueprint is considered to be a guide to the implementation of a service plan

by clearly explaining the appropriate sequence of steps needed to deliver a quality service.

A service blueprint visually displays the roles of customers and employees, and
the visible elements of the service.

We find blueprinting a picture or a map which virtually portrays the service system so that the
providers understand them in a right fashion, is very important activity in services marketing.
At the designing and redesigning stages of development of new services, we find blueprinting
useful. It magnifies the process of service delivery, the points of customers' contact, the roles of
the customers and employees are supposed to play and the visible elements of the service. The
following figure clarifies service blue printing.

SERVICE QUALITY

Definition:

“Service quality is the delivery of excellent or superior service relative to customer

expectations.”
- Zeithaml and Bitner

Perceived Service Quality: -

1. Expectation Exceeds
ES<PS (Excellent Quality)
2. Expectation Met
ES = PS (Satisfaction Quality)
3. Expectation not met
ES>PS (Unacceptable Quality)
 Dimensions of Service Quality: It has been found that customers do not perceive quality
as a one-dimensional concept. The customers’ assessments of quality include perceptions
of multiple factors. For example, it has been suggested that the following five dimensions
of quality are applied to all goods and services:

1. Tangibles: These include the appearance of employees; physical facilities being offered and
equipment which form part of service experience.

2. Reliability: The way the service is being delivered, that is, the ability to deliver the promised
service precisely and consistently.

3. Responsiveness: Willingness to help customers, respond to their queries and also to provide

rapid service to them.

4. Assurance: Understanding and courtesy of staffs and their capability to inspire trust and
confidence.

5. Empathy: Helpful, care about the customers’ requirements and the firm provides individualised
attention to its customers with compassion.

The dimensions of quality are meaningful when applied to categories of products (for example
durable goods, packaged good services. There is a lot of diversity in these dimensions of
service quality, when applied to different products. For example, take the case of two services -
teaching and medical service. The diversity of the dimensions of service quality can be shown
in the form of the table:

SERVICE QUALITY GAP MODEL (SERVQUAL)

The difference between customer expectations and service performance is called as service quality gap.
Service quality gap model is developed by Parasuraman, Zeithalm and Berry in 1985and identified
five different gaps: The aim of this model is to:
 Identify the gaps between customer expectation and the actual services provided at different
stages of service delivery
 Close the gap and improve the customer service.
Gap 1: Knowledge Gap
The knowledge gap is the difference between the customer’s expectations of the service and the
company’s provision of that service.
 
Essentially, this gap arises because management doesn’t know exactly what customers expect. There
are a number of reasons this could happen, including:
 Lack of management and customer interaction.
 Lack of communication between service employees and management.
 Insufficient market research.
  Insufficient relationship focus.
 Failure to listen to customer complaints.
Example:
If Netflix were to suffer from this gap then it could be because they don’t offer the right amount of
newer titles to their customer. If Pizzahut were to suffer from this gap then it could be because they
don’t offer pecan pie. In both cases, customers expect these things but they simply aren’t offered.
 
Gap 2: The Policy Gap
The policy gap is the difference between management’s understanding of the customer needs and the
translation of that understanding into service delivery policies and standards.
 
There are a number of reasons why this gap can occur:
 Lack of customer service standards.
 Poorly defined service levels.
 Failure to regularly update service level standards.
Example:
If Netflix were to suffer from this gap then it could be that they offer all the right shows but the
streaming quality level isn’t high enough. If Pizzahut where to suffer from this gap then it could be they
offer pecan pie but the quality isn’t as good as people expect.
 
This gap causes customers to seek a similar service elsewhere but with better service.
 
Gap 3: The Delivery Gap
The delivery gap is the difference between service delivery policies and standards and the actual
delivery of the service.
 
This gap can occur for a number of reasons:
 Deficiencies in human resources policies.
 Failure to match supply to demand.
 Employee lack of knowledge of the product.
 Lack of cohesive teamwork to deliver the product or service.
Example:
If Netflix were to suffer from this gap then it could be because when the customer selects the show they
want to watch it takes five minutes before it starts to play. In this case, the product isn’t performing as it
should.
If Pizzahut were to suffer from this gap then it could be that when the customer orders the pecan pie
they are informed that the kitchen has run out. In this case, supply hasn’t been adequately matched to
demand.
 
Gap 4: The Communication Gap
The communication gap is the gap between what gets promised to customers through advertising and
what gets delivered.
 
Again. there are a number of reasons why this can happen:
  Overpromising.
 Viewing external communications as separate to what’s going on internally.
 Insufficient communications between the operations and advertising teams.
Communication gaps lead to customer dissatisfaction. This happens because what they receive isn’t
what they were promised. In the worst case, it may cause them to turn to an alternative supplier.
 
Example:
If Netflix were to experience this gap then it could be because that although the service is good it isn’t
as good or as easy to use as depicted in the advert. If Pizza hut were to suffer from this gap then it could
be because the pecan pie was good but it wasn’t as large or delicious as it looked in the advert.
 
Gap 5: The Customer Gap
The customer gap is the difference between customer expectations and customer perceptions. This gap
occurs because customers do not always understand what the service has done for them or they
misinterpret the service quality.
 
Many organizations can be completely blind to this gap. This gap can happen because of one of the
other four gaps, or simply because the customer perceives the quality of the service incorrectly. In a
worst-case scenario, it could lead to a business losing a large proportion of their customers
overnight. Although the company thought there was no gap, the reality was that their customers
were just waiting for someone to fill their perceived gap.

SERVICE QUALITY AUDIT

TOTAL QUALITY MANAGMENT

 TQM was developed by William Deming, a management consultant whose work had a
great impact on Japanese manufacturing.

Total quality management aims to hold all parties involved in the production process
accountable for the overall quality of the final product or service.

TQM is a management philosophy that seeks to integrate all organizational functions

(marketing, finance, design, engineering, and production, customer service, etc.) to focus on meeting
customer needs and organizational objectives.

TQM views an organization as a collection of processes. It maintains that organizations

must strive to continuously improve these processes by incorporating the knowledge and experiences of
workers. The simple objective of TQM is “Do the right things, right the first time, every time.” TQM is
infinitely variable and adaptable. Although originally applied to manufacturing operations, and for a
number of years only used in that area, TQM is now becoming recognized as a generic management
tool, just as applicable in service and public sector organizations.

A typical definition of TQM includes phrases such as: customer focus, the involvement
of all employees, continuous improvement and the integration of quality management into the total
organisation.

Total Quality Management principles: TQM has a number of basic principles which can be
converted to the figure below.
  Commitment: Quality improvement (in all aspect) must be everyone’s job in the organization.
An apparent commitment from the top management, breaking down the barriers for continuous
quality improvement and steps required to provide an environment for changing attitudes must
be provided. Training and support for this should be extended.

 Culture: There should be proper training to effect the changes in attitude and culture.

 Continuous Improvement: Recognize improvement as a continuous process, and not merely a

one-off program.

 Customer Focus: Perfection in service with zero defectives and full satisfaction to end-user
whether it’s internal or external.

 Control: Ensure monitoring and control checks for any deviation from the intended course of
implementation.

CUSTOMER SATISFACTION MEASURES

“Customer satisfaction” is a person’s feelings of pleasure or displeasure resulting from

comparing a product’s perceived performance or the outcome in relation to his or her expectation.

In case, performance falls short of expectations, the customer is dissatisfied and if the
performance matches the expectations, the customer is satisfied.
If the performance exceeds his or her expectations the customer is highly satisfied or delighted.
 Measuring the Consumer Satisfaction:

In today’s global economy, it is the competition that decides the forces of buyers and
sellers. However, the customer-centric companies are measuring the level of customer satisfaction
and factors that sharpen it.

This is possible only when the organisation gets a regular, reliable verifiable feedback
from the customers. This calls for, to repeat the correct measurement of consumer satisfaction and
take up appropriate action plan to improve it further.

Measurement of customer satisfaction provides multi-angled information or feedback,

which helps the marketing unit to en-cash upon. These are business related, customer-related,
supplier- related, competitors-related, and performance related and the like.

There are following methods to measure customer satisfaction:

1. Direct Methods: Directly contacting customers and getting their valuable feedback is very
important. Following are some of the ways by which customers could be directly tabbed:

a. Getting customer feedback through third party agencies.

b. Direct marketing, in-house call centres, complaint handling department could be
treated as first point of contact for getting customer feedback. These feedbacks are compiled
to analyze customers’ perception.
 c. Getting customer feedback through face to face conversation or meeting.
d. Direct customer feedback through surveys and questionnaires.

Organizations mostly employ external agencies to listen to their customers and

provide dedicated feedback to them. These feedbacks need to be sophisticated and in structured
format so that conclusive results could be fetched out. Face to face meetings and complaint or
appreciation letter engages immediate issues. The feedback received in this is not uniformed as
different types of customers are addressed with different domains of questions. This hider the
analysis process to be performed accurately and consistently. Hence the best way is to implement a
proper survey which consists of uniformed questionnaire to get customer feedback from well
segmented customers. The design of the prepared questionnaire is an important aspect and should
enclose all the essential factors of business. The questions asked should be in a way that the
customer is encouraged to respond in a obvious way/. These feedbacks could receive by the
organizations can be treated as one of the best ways to measure customer satisfaction.

Apart from the above methods there is another very popular direct method
which is surprise market visit. By this, information regarding different segment of products and
services provided to the customers could be obtained in an efficient manner. It becomes easy for
the supplier to know the weak and strong aspects of products and services.

2. Indirect Method: The major drawback of direct methods is that it turns out to be very costly and
requires a lot of pre compiled preparations to implement. For getting the valuable feedbacks the
supplier totally depends on the customer due to which they lose options and chances to take
corrective measure at correct time. Hence there are other following indirect methods of getting
feedback regarding customer satisfaction.

a. Customer Complaints: Customer’s complaints are the issues and problems reported by

the customer to supplier with regards to any specific product or related service. These
complaints can be classified under different segments according to the severity and
department. If the complaints under a particular segment go high in a specific period of
time then the performance of the organization is degrading in that specific area or segment.
But if the complaints diminish in a specific period of time then that means the organization
is performing well and customer satisfaction level is also higher.

b. Customer Loyalty:  Customer loyalty is the likelihood of repurchasing products or

services. Customer satisfaction is a major predictor for repurchasing and it is influenced by
explicit performance of the product, value and quality. Loyalty is basically measured when
a customer recommends to a friend, family member about given product. Overall
satisfaction, repurchasing and likelihood of recommending to a friend are indicators of
customer satisfaction.