Building Service Aspirations

The service generating organizations building service aspirations in the process of

generating demand for the services. The aspirations may be generated in two
ways, namely, generating aspirations to serve the users and generating
aspirations to use the services.
Service aspirations of organization engaged in generating services focus on offering
quality services. Quality is generally conceptualized as an attitude towards service.
 Marketing Mix In Service Marketing
Seven P’s of marketing
 Seven P’s of marketing
1) Product – The product in service marketing mix is intangible in nature
For example – a restaurant blue print will be prepared before establishing a restaurant
business. This service blue print defines exactly how the product is going to be. 
2) Place – Place in case of services determine where is the service product going to be
located. For eg: best place to open a petrol pump 
3) Promotion – Services are easy to be duplicated and hence it is generally the brand
which sets a service apart from its counterpart. For e.g.. Banks, IT companies place
themselves above the rest by advertising or promotions. 
4) Pricing – Pricing in case of services is rather more difficult than in case of products.
For eg: in restaurant, pricing is done for food 
5) People – People is one of the elements of service marketing mix. People define a
service. For eg: restaurant: chef
Companies are involved into specially getting their staff trained in interpersonal skills
and customer service with a focus towards customer satisfaction. 
6) Process – Service process is the way in which a service is delivered to the end
customer.
 
7) Physical Evidence –to create a better customer experience tangible elements are also
delivered with the service. E.g restaurant ambience,
Physical evidence is used as a differentiator in service marketing. E.g.: private and
public hospitals
 Product Decision
Levels of product decisions
• Product mix decisions.-product, price, promotion and distribution channels
• Product line decisions.- Product line filling, Product stretching
• Brand decisions.- name, term, sign, symbol
• Brand – strategies decisions.- connected to consumer needs, emotions, and
competitive environments.
• Brand equity.- value is determined by consumer perception of and experiences 
• Packaging and licensing.-designing and producing container or wrapper
• Product positioning and communication decisions.-how to best communicate
their products' attributes to their target customers based on customer needs,
competitive pressures, available communication channels and carefully crafted key
messages.
• Product portfolio management decisions- company growth prospects, profit
margin drivers, income contributions, market leadership, and operational risk.
• Market segment decision -characteristics, needs ,purchasing behavior, or
consumption patterns
• Product specifications. – product quality, TQM, product features, style and design
 Pricing
PRICING OF SERVICES
Pricing decisions are of major importance in service marketing strategy. As with other
marketing mix elements, the price of a service should be related to the
achievement of marketing and organisational goals and should be appropriate for
the service organisation’s marketing program.
Characteristics of Services and their Influence upon Service Prices
(a) Service Perishability
(b) use of many services.
(c) Apparent Intangibility has many price implications
(d) Where service products are fairly homogeneous 
(e) time limits on markets that can be served

Methods of Pricing Services

(i) Cost-Based Pricing
(a) Profit orientated: aiming at a minimum profit target. Prices fixed by professional
and trade associations belong to this category. If entry is severely restricted, prices
will be related more to the customer’s ability and willingness to pay and less to
costs.
(b) Government-controlled prices: aiming at consumer protection by fixing prices on a
cost-plus-a-modest-margin basis.
 Pricing
(ii) Market-orientated pricing
(a) Competitive: Either accepting the going rate or maintaining or increasing market
share by an aggressive pricing policy.
(b) Customer oriented: Prices set with regard to consumers’ attitudes and behavior.
Quality and costs of services may be varied to remain in harmony with prices.
Other types of pricing
(a) Differential or flexible pricing
(b) Discrete pricing
(c) Discount pricing
(d) Diversionary pricing
(e) Guarantee pricing
(f) High price maintenance pricing
(g) Loss leader pricing
(h) Offset pricing
(i) Price lining.
 Service Marketing Strategies and tactics 
Strategies
When service firms think of marketing strategies, they usually consider outbound and
direct techniques.
• Market Research
• Niche strategy
• High performance website
• Search engine optimization
• Social media
• Advertising
• Marketing automation, CRM, and lead nurturing
• Analytics and reporting

Tactics
• Specialization, Not Emotionalization
• It’s Time to Talk about Your Content Marketing Tool
• Referral Marketing 
• Professional Services 
• One Word... Free
 Promotion of service and placing of distribution
Promotion (marketing) In marketing, promotion refers to any type of marketing
communication used to inform or persuade target audiences of the relative merits
of a product, service, brand or issue.

Different ways to promote a product or service

• Offer Customers an Exclusive Preview

• Social Media Contests
• Email Marketing
• Face book Ads
• In-Store Promotions
• Host an Event
• Offer an Upgrade or Trade-In
• Share Customer Reviews
• Share on Social Media
 Promotion of service and placing of
Distribution
distribution
It is the process of making a product or service available for the consumer or business
user that needs it. This can be done directly by the producer or service provider, or
using indirect channels with distributors or intermediaries.
Place refers to distribution or the methods and location you use for your products
or services to be easily accessible to the target customers.
It needs to have a retail interface with the target customers if you want to sell directly.

On a macro level, there are two types of distribution.

1) Indirect distribution.
2) Direct distribution.
3) Intensive distribution.
4) Selective distribution.
5) Exclusive distribution.

Distribution Methods of services

• Direct Sales Method
• Virtual Service Distribution
• Distribution through Publication
• Agents or Referrals
 Dimension in services marketing
The five SERVQUAL dimensions are:
• TANGIBLES-Appearance of physical facilities, equipment, personnel, and
communication materials
• RELIABILITY-Ability to perform the promised service dependably and accurately
• RESPONSIVENESS-Willingness to help customers and provide prompt service
• ASSURANCE-Knowledge and courtesy of employees and their ability to convey trust
and confidence
• EMPATHY-Caring, individualized attention the firm provides its customers

1. Just Do It
RELIABILITY: Do what you say you’re going to do when you said you were going to do it.
Customers want to count on their providers. They value that reliability. Don’t providers
yearn to find out what customers value? This is it. It’s three times more important
to be reliable than have shiny new equipment or flashy uniforms.
Doesn’t mean you can have ragged uniforms and only be reliable. Service providers
have to do both. But providers first and best efforts are better spent making service
reliable.
Whether it’s periodics on schedule, on-site response within Service Level Agreements
(SLAs), or Work Orders completed on time.
 Dimension in services marketing
2. Do It Now
RESPONSIVENESS: Respond quickly, promptly, rapidly, immediately, instantly.
Waiting a day to return a call or email doesn’t make it. Even if customers are chronically
slow in getting back to providers, responsiveness is more than 1/5th of their service
quality assessment.
REPORTING RESPONSIVENESS
Call centres typically track caller wait times. Service providers can track response times.
And their attainment of SLAs or other Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of
responsiveness. This is great performance data to present to customers in
Departmental Performance Reviews.
3. Know What You’re Doing
ASSURANCE: Service providers are expected to be the experts of the service they’re
delivering. It’s a given.
SERVQUAL research showed it’s important to communicate that expertise to
customers. If a service provider is highly skilled, but customers don’t see that, their
confidence in that provider will be lower. And their assessment of that provider’s
service quality will be lower.
RAISE CUSTOMER AWARENESS OF YOUR COMPETENCIES
Service providers must communicate their expertise and competencies – before they
do the work. This can be done in many ways that are repeatedly seen by customers
 Dimension in services marketing
4. Care about Customers as much as the Service
EMPATHY: Services can be performed completely to specifications. Yet customers
may not feel provider employees care about them during delivery. And this hurts
customers’ assessments of providers’ service quality.
SERVICE DELIVERY MATTERS
Providers’ service delivery can be as important as how it was done. Provider
employees should be trained how to interact with customers and their end-users.
Even a brief session during initial orientation helps. Anything to help them
understand their impact on customers’ assessment of service quality.
5. Look Sharp
TANGIBLES: Even though this is the least important dimension, appearance matters.
Just not as much as the other dimensions.
Service providers will still want to make certain their employees appearance,
uniforms, equipment, and work areas on-site (closets, service offices, etc.) look
good. The danger is for providers to make everything look sharp, and then fall
short on RELIABILITY or RESPONSIVENESS.
 Additional dimensions
• People – All companies are reliant on the people who run them from front line
Sales staff to the Managing Director. Having the right people is essential because
they are as much a part of your business offering as the products/services you are
offering.
People are a defining factor in a service delivery process, since a service is inseparable
from the person providing it. Thus, a restaurant is known as much for its food as
for the service provided by its staff. The same is true of banks and department
stores. Consequently, customer service training for staff has become a top priority
for many organizations today.
• Processes –The delivery of your service is usually done with the customer present
so how the service is delivered is once again part of what the consumer is paying
for.
The process of service delivery is crucial since it ensures that the same standard of
service is repeatedly delivered to the customers. Therefore, most companies have
a service blue print which provides the details of the service delivery process,
often going down to even defining the service script and the greeting phrases to
be used by the service staff.
 Additional dimensions

• Physical Evidence – Almost all services include some physical elements even if the
bulk of what the consumer is paying for is intangible. For example a hair salon
would provide their client with a completed hairdo and an insurance company
would give their customers some form of printed material. Even if the material is
not physically printed (in the case of PDFs) they are still receiving a “physical
product” by this definition.
Since services are intangible in nature most service providers strive to incorporate
certain tangible elements into their offering to enhance customer experience.
Thus, there are hair salons that have well designed waiting areas often with
magazines and plush sofas for patrons to read and relax while they await their
turn. Similarly, restaurants invest heavily in their interior design and decorations to
offer a tangible and unique experience to their guests.