Services Marketing:

People, Technology, Strategy

CHAPTER 7
Promoting Services And Educating
Customers

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 Learning Objectives
• Know the 5 ‘W’s of the Integrated Service Communications Model, i.e.,
Who, What, How, Where and When.
• Be familiar with three broad target audiences (“Who”) for any service
communications program.
• Understand most common strategic and tactical service communications
objectives (“What”).
• Be familiar with “Service Marketing Communications Funnel” and its key
objectives
• Know important specific roles assumed by service marketing
communications.
• Understand challenges of service communications and how service
communications can overcome these (“How”).
• Be familiar with marketing communications mix with reference to
services (“Where”).

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 Learning Objectives
• Know elements of traditional marketing communications channels.
• Know role of the Internet, mobile, apps, quick response (QR) code and
other electronic media in service marketing communications.
• Know elements of communications available via service delivery
channels.
• Know communications mix elements that originate outside the firm.
• Understand when communications should take place (“When”), how
to set budgets for service communications and programs, and how to
evaluate these programs.
• Appreciate ethical and consumer privacy related issues in service
marketing communications.
• Understand role of corporate design in communications.
• Know importance of integrated marketing communications to deliver
a powerful brand identity.

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Integrated Service Marketing Communications

• Communication is the most visible or audible form of

marketing activities.
• Through communications, marketers explain and
promote the value proposition their firm is offering.
• It should be used intelligently in conjunction with
other marketing efforts for maximizing value.
• Communications must be viewed with a broader
perspective than just as media advertising, public
relations, social media and professional salespeople.

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Integrated Service Communications Model

Figure 7.2 Integrated Service

Communications Model

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 The 5 ‘W’s Model For Marketing &
Communications Planning
• Who is our target audience?
• What do we need to communicate and
achieve?
• How should we communicate this?
• Where should we communicate this?
• When should the communication take place?

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 Defining The Target Audience
Target audience for Marketing Communications:
• Prospects — not usually known in advance
Employ a traditional communications mix, comprising of
elements such as media advertising, online advertising, public
relations, and use of purchased lists for direct mail or telemarketing.
• Users — existing target audience
Reach by cross- or up-selling efforts by frontline employees, point-of-
sale promotions, other information distributed during service
encounters, and location-based mobile apps.
• Employees — secondary audience
A well-designed communications campaign through public media
targeted at customers can also be motivating for employees.

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 Specifying Service Communication
Objectives
• Strategic Service Communications Objectives
– Include building a service brand, and positioning it and its
service products against competition.

• Tactical Service Communications Objectives

– Relate to shaping and managing customer’s perceptions,
beliefs, attitudes, and behavior in any of the three stages of
the service consumption process.
– The Service Marketing Communications Funnel is aligned to
the Attention-Interest-Desire-Action (AIDA) and Hierarchy of
Effects models.

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The Service Marketing Communications
Funnel And Communications Objectives

Figure 7.3 Common

Communications Objectives
along the Service Marketing
Communications Funnel

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 Maximizing Value From Service
Communication Strategy
• Promote tangible cues to communicate quality.
• Add value through communication content.
• Facilitate customer involvement in service
production.
• Promote the contribution of service personnel and
backstage operations.
• Stimulate and shift demand to match capacity.

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Crafting Effective Service Communication
Messages
Challenges in developing communication messages include:
Problems of Intangibility
– Abstractness - financial security or investment-related matters
do not have one-to-one correspondence with physical objects
– Generality - items that comprise of a class of objects, persons
or events are general and not specific enough
– Non-searchability - many of the service attributes cannot be
searched or inspected physically before they are purchased
– Mental impalpability - many services are sufficiently complex,
multi-dimensional or novel; it is difficult to understand the
experience of using them
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Overcoming The Problems Of Intangibility
• Specific communications strategies can be
created by marketers
• Using tangible cues and metaphors are two
other methods firms can use to create strategies
– Tangible Cues - “vivid information” that catches the
audience’s attention.
– Metaphors - metaphors that are tangible in nature
to help communicate the benefits of their service
offerings and to emphasize key points of
differentiation.

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Table 7.1 Advertising Strategies for Overcoming Intangibility

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The Services Marketing Communications Mix

Figure 7.10 The Marketing Communications

Mix for Services 14
 Sources Of Messages

1. Messages transmitted through traditional

marketing channels.
2. Messages transmitted online.
3. Messages transmitted through service
delivery channels.
4. Messages originating from outside the
organization.

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Three Key Sources Of Messages

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 1. Messages Transmitted Through
Traditional Marketing Channels
• Advertising
– The first point of contact between service marketers and their customers.
– Marketers are increasingly trying to be more creative with their advertising
to allow their messages to be more effective.
• Sales Promotion
– Employed for short-term objectives e.g., to accelerate the purchasing
decision or in motivating customers to use a specific service sooner.
– Sales promotions for service firms may take various forms e.g., samples,
coupons and other discounts, gifts, and competitions with prizes.
• Direct Marketing
– Offer the potential to send personalized messages to highly targeted micro-
segments.
– In the permission marketing model, the goal is to persuade consumers to
volunteer their attention.

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 1. Messages Transmitted Through
Traditional Marketing Channels
• Personal Selling
– Firms in business-to-business services maintain a sales
team or employ agents and distributors to undertake
personal selling efforts on their behalf.
• Public Relations
– PR tools can help a service organization build its reputation
and credibility, form strong relationships with its
employees, customers and the community.

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2. Messages Transmitted Through Service
Delivery Channels
• Service Outlets
– Both planned and unintended messages reach customers
through the medium of the service delivery environment itself.
• Frontline Employees
– Communication from frontline staff takes the form of the core
service and a variety of supplementary services, including
providing information, giving advice etc.
• Self-Service Delivery Points
– ATMs, vending machines, websites, and service apps can be
used effectively in communications with current and potential
customers.

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 2. Messages Transmitted Online
• Company’s Website
– Creating consumer awareness and interest.
– Providing information and consultation.
– Allowing two-way communications with customers through
email and chat rooms.
– Encouraging product trial.
– Enabling customers to place orders.
– Measuring the effectiveness of specific advertising or
promotional campaigns.
• Online Advertising
– Banner Advertising
– Search Engine Advertising

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 3. Messages Originating From Outside
The Organization
• Word-of-Mouth (WOM)
– Positive WOM is important as services tend to have a high proportion
of experience and credence attributes, and are therefore, associated
with high perceived risk by potential buyers
– Referral reward programs work well for close friends & family

• Blogs, Twitter, and other social media as a type of online WOM

– Service firms monitor blogs and view them as a form of immediate
market research and feedback
• Media coverage
– Traditional media coverage of firms and their services is often
through a firm’s PR activity. Even today, this sector in the firm
promises a wide reach.
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E.g. Budget Carriers Using Online Channels to
Drive Ticket Sales

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 Timing Decisions Of Services Marketing
Communications

• Timing is closely matched to the various perceptions

and behaviors the firm wants to manage in the
Service Communications Funnel
• Timing of communications is typically managed in a
flowchart of the media plan

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 Budget Decisions And Program
Evaluation
• Service firms use a number of methods to determine their
communications budget:
– Allocating a percentage of sales or profit
– Matching competitors’ spent amount
– Using last year’s budget
• Using objective-and-task method
– Defining the communications objectives
– Determining the tasks needed
– Estimating the costs
• Empirical research method
– Run a series of tests or field experiments with different
communications budgets to determine the optimum level of
communications spent
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 Ethical And Consumer Privacy Issues
In Communications
• Unrealistic service promises
• Unethical advertisers and salespeople
• Deceptive promotions
• Unwanted intrusion

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 The Role Of Corporate Design
• Key to ensure that a consistent style and message is
communicated throughout a firm’s communications mix
channels.
• Employ unified and distinctive visual appearance for all tangible
elements to facilitate recognition and reinforce a desired brand
image.
• A few popular corporate designs:
– Using the name as a central element in corporate design
– Using a trademark symbol
– Creating tangible and recognizable symbols to associate
with their respective corporate brand names
– Using colors in the corporate designs

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Corporate Design Strategies

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 Integrated Marketing
Communications
• IMC ties together and reinforces all
communications in order to deliver a powerful
brand identity.
• The communications from different media and
communications approaches all become part of
a single overall message about the service firm
and its products.

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