Service Marketing

Services marketing is a sub field of marketing. Services marketing entails in it the business to consumer (B2C) and business to business (B2B) services.

Service marketing is the next day challenge for marketing department of every organization.

The growing consumer demand for more services has brought forth and accelerated effort on the part of marketing giants to satisfy these needs and to increase their own customer base and to ultimately increase profits and more importantly to stay alive in competition.

Learn about:-

1. Meaning of Service Marketing 2. Concept of Service Marketing 3. Scope 4. Objectives 5. Characteristics 6. Goods versus Service Marketing

7. Significance 8. Types of Services 9. Approaches. 10. Role 11. Attributes 12. Environmental Factors Affecting Service Marketing 13. Factors Influencing Consumer Expectations of Services

14. Customer Perception of Services 15. Variables and Marketing Strategies. 16. Service Marketing Mix 17. Pricing 18. Communication 19. Customization 20. Marketing Challenges

21. Globalization of Service Market 22. Problems Faced by a Marketer of Services 23. Benefits Due to the Growing Service Industry 24. Growth and Development of Service Marketing.

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Service Marketing: Meaning, Scope, Objectives and Challenges

Service Marketing – Meaning

Services marketing is a sub field of marketing. Services marketing entails in it the business to consumer (B2C) and business to business (B2B) services. The offerings in this case is not a tangible product but an intangible service.

Service marketing is the next day challenge for marketing department of every organization. The growing consumer demand for more services has brought forth and accelerated effort on the part of marketing giants to satisfy these needs and to increase their own customer base and to ultimately increase profits and more importantly to stay alive in competition.

According to financial times lexicon, service marketing focuses on the distinctive characteristics of services and how they affect both customer behavior and marketing strategy. For example many services are produced and delivered with the customer present at the service firm’s facility.

It is basic human tendency to look for comfort after basic needs are fulfilled. This trend is unchangeable across the world. Thus in all parts of the world basic needs are primary and after satisfaction of those tends to improve their standard of living with satisfying secondary or comforting needs.

This is proved by history constantly showing increasing share of service sector in countries GDP. This is applicable like a general rule in all countries including the developed as well as developing countries, or even in undeveloped countries.

Economics history from ancient period tells us that all developing nations have invariably experienced a shift from agriculture to industry and then to service sector, as the main state of the economy. As a result of this shift, standard or traditional manufacturing goods has replaced by service base enterprise. This shift is often regarded as ‘Second Industrial Revolution’.

Service Marketing therefore occupies significant portion of marketing studies. The trend of shifting is so drastic that all marketing techniques previously advocated needed to be changed. Some of the facts about the service marketing will show, how the shift have resulted and affected world economies.

Important fact is that this shift is one sided and so drastic that all corporate must study a new dimension of marketing for satisfying this new expectations of people who ultimately contribute towards this increase.

Therefore it is of at most important to study service marketing because it is the current marketing study.

Service marketing studies, value-creating-customer-provider interactions, outcomes and relationship that extends tools and methods of marketing.

Basically 3 p’s must be added with 4 p’s of traditional marketing. Those 3p’s are – People, process and physical evidence.

Thus it can be concluded that service marketing includes building customer loyalty, complaint handling, managing relationships, improving service quality and productivity of service operations and how to become a better service provider in industry.

Services can be defined as the economic activities offered by one party to another. For the same the customer is charged with the money, time, and effort, and in turn he expects a value from the goods, and services.

Here the consumers do not take the ownership of any of the service elements of the product.

Examples of such offerings to the consumers are telecommunication services, hospitality services, financial services, health care, air travel, and consultancy professional services.

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Service Marketing – Concept

In the early stages of the development of service sector, the boss or the owner of service activity knew nothing or little aspects of services management. Professional service management techniques as known today were unheard of in the early stages. Indeed, business management itself, in the professional sense that we think of today, was still in its formative stages.

Peter Drucker, the modern management guru, had yet to publish his first work on the subject. But over the years (From Taylorism to today’s “Do it, Get it” approach) much water has flown and management functions have fully crystallized. However, several empirical studies are still going on.

New dimensions and concepts have been added to every functional area of management:

i) More emotional than a business model

ii) Deeper than a brand

iii) More complex than a good idea

iv) More solid than a vision

v) Can unite employees and customers, and

vi) Can create competitive advantage.

Are the marketing concept and practices developed in manufacturing companies directly transferable to service organizations in which no transfer of ownership takes place. The answer is often “no”. The marketing concepts in the service sector tend to differ from those in the manufacturing sector in several important aspects.

1. Most service products cannot be inventoried – Since, services involve actions or performances, they are temporary and perishable and so can’t usually be stocked as inventory following production. If there’s no demand, unused capacity is wasted and the firm loses the chance to create value from these assets.

2. Intangible elements usually dominate value creation – Many services include important physical elements, such as spare parts installed during repairs, band cards, cheque books, hotel beds etc. However, often it is intangible elements such as processes, internet-based transitions, expertise and attitudes of the service personnel, who create the most value in service performances

3. Services are often difficult to visualize and understand – Mental intangibility is most likely to present a problem for first-time customers, who lack prior exposure to a particular type of service. Frequent users have the advantage of past experiences that can serve as a benchmark.

4. Customers may be involved in co-production – Few services require customers to participate actively in co-producing the service product. For instance, the customer is expected to co­operate and guide the service personnel in settings such as hair salon, hotels, fast food centres even doing some of the work themselves rather than being waited upon like while using library or purchasing online.

5. The time factor often assumes great importance – Many services are delivered in real time, while customers are physically present. Customers may be willing to pay extra to save time, such as taking a flight when superfast trains are available on the same route.

6. Distribution may take place through Non-Physical channels – Some service provider use electronic channels to deliver all of their service elements. Today’s banks offer customers a choice of distribution channels, including visiting a branch, visiting networks of ATM’s, transaction via internet. Notice how fares vary according to time and place, make a reservation, indicate any special needs such as meal, extra luggage and pay for the ticket.

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Service Marketing – Scope

In marketing, any reference to product normally applies to service also. While defining the term ‘marketing ‘William J. Stanson has said, it is a total system of interacting business activities designed to plan price, promote and distribute want – satisfying products and services to products and services to present and potential customers, and distribute clear from this definition that all marketing activities focus not only on want – satisfying products but on services as well.

The Scope of Services Marketing:

(i) Financial Services:

The financial services such as – banking and insurance services are an important part of an economy. This is the area which really needs to be strengthened. Financial services like banking and insurance services can be considered as a backbone of a business.

In India, the financial system has improved in terms of number of financial instruments, the number of active participants in the market and the introduction of online financial services like internet banking. Both banks and insurance companies have introduced customized online services with the help of technology to ensure greater customer convenience. Financial services are presented to customers in varied forms – business loans, consumer loans, payment merchant services, insurance services, bank lockers, saving accounts, salary account, fix deposit schemes, etc.

(ii) Health Services:

India is the major player in the world in healthcare industry. Low costs combined with excellent facilities have stimulated the development of health care service. Hospitals serve the masses by launching mass awareness programmers to prevent ailment, which will pave way for a healthy life of the people. The marketing principles for Medicare services focus on distributing the services to users in a decent way.

(iii) Tourism Services:

Tourism in Indian is growing rapidly and is playing an important role in Indian economy. The travel and tourism industry is at boom with so many attractive offering available for the travel lovers. It includes so many world tour packages also at affordable prices. In developing countries like India tourism has become one of the major sectors of the economy, contributing to a large proportion of the National Income and generating huge employment opportunities. It has become the fastest growing service industry in the country with great potentials for its further expansion and diversification.

(iv) Education Services:

The education sector in India is poised to witness major growth in the years to come as India will have world’s largest tertiary-age population and second largest graduate talent pipeline globally by the end of 2020. As of now the education market is worth US$ 100 billion. Currently, higher education contributes 59.7 per cent of the market size, school education 38.1 per cent, pre-school segment 1.6 per cent, and technology and multi-media the remaining 0.6 per cent.

(v) Hospitality Services:

The Indian tourism and hospitality industry has materialized as one of the key drivers of growth among the services sectors in India. It contributes to 6.23 per cent to the National GDP and 8.78 per cent of the total employment in the country. Constant transformation, functional growth and improving standards have gained the hospitality industry of India approval all over the world.

(vi) Domestic Services:

In India the domestic service sector is a rapidly growing sector with lots of potential of growth. The domestic services include the housekeeping services, security services, maids for domestic help, day care services etc.

Conclusion:

In the India, service jobs now account for 70 per cent of all jobs and 65 per cent of gross domestic product. More and more market offerings now contain a service component, both to meet the needs of the targeted customer segment and to create a distinctive differentiation for competitive reasons.

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Service Marketing – Top 13 Objectives

The services as laid down by any organization have some missions and objectives for efficient service performance.

The objectives of service marketing in any organization are summarized here:

(i) Determine the service objectives, policies and process and ways to implement effectively,

(ii) Determine service plans, methods and strategies to conduct efficient service performance,

(iii) Determine the standards and parameters in context of service quality and design for service performance,

(iv) Determine the directions and basic guidelines to manage customers’ care services,

(v) Determine the service targets and its market segments on the basis of customers’ profile,

(vi) Determine most comfort, convenient and easiest process of service performance,

(vii) Provide needful training, remuneration, promotion and developmental aspects to service employees,

(viii) To make proper coordination between service expectations and service performances,

(ix) To make effective decisions about operational service quality of performance.

(x) To manage service operations where values are realised for the services that are delivered,

(xi) To make effective and targets oriented relations with customers,

(xii) To manage and implement the quality parameters in service performance,

(xiii) To overcome and solve the problems and challenges arising out of service performance.

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Service Marketing – Unique Characteristics (With Marketing Strategies)

The many marketing strategies associated with each of these service characteristics are described below:

1. Intangibility:

Most services are intangible, even though the production of a service may be linked to a tangible product (the transportation service an airline provides is tied to its fleet of airplanes, renting a video-taped movie is tied to the temporary usage of the videocassette, and so on.)

The element of intangibility makes the marketing of services different from the marketing of tangible goods. Intangibility means that buyers normally cannot see, feel, smell, hear, or taste a service before they conclude an exchange agreement with a seller. Because of this intangibility, consumers may misunderstand the exact nature of a service.

For most of us, something that is intangible is more difficult to grasp than something that is tangible. Evaluation the quality of something intangible is difficult. To help consumers understand and evaluate the nature of their services, marketers often employ a marketing strategy to make the intangible tangible.

It can be argued that because of a service’s intangibility, customers who cannot taste, feel, smell, or watch a product in operation in advance purchase promises of satisfaction. Thus, implementing a strategy to make a service tangible requires stressing symbolic clues or providing supplemental tangible evidence to indicate that the promise about a service’s quality will be kept.

This may be as simple as polishing the brass railings to symbolically enhance a restaurant’s atmosphere. Or, as the Mr. Good wrench campaign for GM’s service illustrates, an entire marketing program may be developed to provide tangible symbols that the promise of good service will be kept.

Prominently displaying a brand name and logo on the organisation’s letterhead, facilities, and equipment or highlighting them in advertising and sales promotion efforts are more subtle ways to associate a tangible symbol with a service.

Associating the company with a stag is an attempt to attach a visual symbol to an intangible-insurance service. An additional dimension of this ad is the use of celebrity spokespersons to create confidence that the service marketer is committed to the promise of satisfaction.

Promotional messages often portray the people who provide the service to make the service more tangible. All State’s slogan “You’re in good hands with all state” promotes the fact that the people and the company are reliable. You can see for yourself that these are good people; if they promise something; you can rely on the promise being fulfilled.

Effectively marketing intangibles realise on developing a symbolic appearance of competency and credibility. Consumers should believe that what is promised will be delivered. The strategy of creating tangibility through symbols is typically implemented with branding and through the promotion mix.

However, service marketers often include physical goods tied to their services to provide additional tangible evidence of the promised service. A health club membership comes with a membership card. A dentist’s gift of a toothbrush is evidence that a dental service has been performed.

In a hotel room, the bathroom drinking glasses are wrapped in fresh bags or plastic film, providing silent symbols communicating that the room has been cleaned for the guests’ use.

2. Perishability:

Leo Burnett, the founder of a major advertising agency, said, “All our assets go down the elevator every evening.” He was referring to the fact that services are perishable; services provided by humans cannot be stored. Thus, if the ability to produce a service exists, but this productive capacity goes unused because demand for the service is low, units of the intangible offering “perish.”

Consider, for example, an airplane flying from Atlanta to Charleston with half its seats empty. Every minute that the plane is in the air, it produces a transport service, which is consumed simultaneously by the passengers on board. The airline cannot store the service equivalent of the empty seats on that particular flight for later sale.

No-shows at a dentist’s office, empty seats at the opera or in a movie theatre, the absence of students in a classroom, and a slow night at a restaurant represent cases where all or part of the service supplier’s inventory of productive capacity has been lost because of perishability.

Because perishable services cannot be inventoried, service marketers plan and implement demand management strategies (also called capacity management strategies). Effective demand management requires the accurate forecasting of the need for services.

A dentist who inaccurately forecasts the time to administer a service may alienate waiting patients, who then seek the services of competitors. Service capacity management involves managing a service’s supply to be in line with a service’s demand.

For example, restaurants often hire extra part-time employees to work during peak times or offer price reductions during slow times to even out demand. Because service marketers can’t store their products for sale at some other time, they must pay special attention to price adjustments. When prices fall, a dentist’s services cannot be warehoused until price rise again.

The services marketer must keep busy, and unlike the marketer of goods, cannot keep busy by building inventory. Pricing strategy provides an important tool for levelling the service marketer’s demand. To adjust for losses due to perishability, service marketers often implement two-part pricing.

The user or subscriber of the service pays two prices – the fixed fee (for example, membership initiation) plus a variable usage fee (for example, tennis court time). Many hotels, restaurants, and airlines sell the service in advance and/or require reservations to avoid problems associated with the perishable nature of service.

Airlines are known for overbooking flights, because not all travellers are able to be on time for their flights. When everyone does show up, the airlines offer free tickets or a monetary incentive to individuals willing to take an alternate flight. Selling services in advance and requiring reservations are only part of a demand management strategy.

3. Inseparability:

In marketing exchanges of tangible goods, the producers (for example, industrial engineers or assembly line workers) need not come in direct contact with those who buy the goods. Because it is possible to separate production from consumption in tangible product exchanges, distinct selling and marketing departments evolved naturally to handle the activities aimed at consummating these exchanges.

This type of separation is often impossible in marketing intangible services. In many cases, services are inseparable from their producers. Inseparability means that producer and consumer may have to be present in the same place at the same time for the service transaction to occur. Inseparability changes the sequence of events usually present in the exchange of a product with prospective buyers.

In goods marketing, the product is first produced, then sold, and then consumed. Although some goods are not produced until a firm order has been received (speciality robots or customer-tailored dresses, for instance), in most cases producers of tangibles can produce, show, or display their offerings.

Suppose however, a patient is to be operated on by a surgeon. Delivering the promised service requires the simultaneous presence of both surgeon and patient. Should some problem prevent either from being present, the other is likely to suffer. If the surgeon does not appear, the patient’s problem may have to continue for an additional time, or an unfamiliar surgeon may have to perform the operation.

Conversely, if the patient fails to show for the operation, the surgeon is left with unproductive time and therefore may lose income. Essentially, inseparability constrains the flexibility that service suppliers have in designing their offerings, because the amount of service they can produce depends largely on the amount of time they have available.

Neither a surgeon nor a hairdresser nor a rock singer can squeeze more than a certain number of operations, haircuts, or live concerts into a given day or month.

For many services, the consumer actively participates in the production process. At a travel agency, for example, the agent interacts with the customer to make a reservation that best suits the customer’s desires. Because inseparability often demands such personal contact between buyer and seller, it can cause many distribution problems.

Thus, most channels of distribution for services are direct channels in which the service provider markets the product directly to the consumer or organisational user. An accountant, for example, deals directly with a client. Because of the element of inseparability, service organisations have been extremely production oriented in the approach to distribution within their marketing strategies.

For instance, hospitals were located at the corner of such and such streets, and their clients were expected to visit the “factory.” Today, under more competitive conditions, hospitals realise the need for convenient, multiple locations; emergency care centres; and ambulatory care centres that supplement the main hospital.

Universities traditionally were located in small rural towns, and students could come to the service facility to purchase the service. Today, however, universities offer extension programs, telecommunication programs, and classes in urban business centres. Banks no longer have a single location but offer many locations utilizing automatic teller services.

Because of inseparability, service providers tend to see themselves more as creators or producers of an offering than as its marketers. They tend to accent the pride, technical difficulties, and other elements involved in production instead of understanding the need to satisfy consumers.

In other words, many service providers are more production oriented than customer oriented. (The accompanying Competitive Strategy feature describes one service provider that successfully saw a demand in the marketplace and borrowed techniques from goods marketing for its own successful promotion.)

Overcoming this orientation problem leads to an odd sort of strategy in which the production process is considered a marketing activity. Thus, managing personnel becomes a marketing activity, because the standards for personnel effectiveness and efficiency must be based on consumers’ perceptions, not assembly line standards.

Most services are delivered by people. The quality of contact between the customers and frontline staff provides the competitive edge, so employees are the key to success. The service marketer must therefore consider employees part of the service offering. The doctor’s bedside manner and the lawyer’s receptionist’s personality are part of the product offered to consumers.

Competent employees must be hired and trained so that they perform the service the proper way. Service employees need to know the marketing goals and be trained to serve well and respond to any complaints. In short, they must be trained to assure consumer satisfaction.

4. Heterogeneity:

Because many intangible offerings are closely tied to the supplier’s personal performance, there can be great variability among the services provided. Standardising services — that is, reducing service heterogeneity- is difficult. It is not possible to prescribe and deliver equal amounts of “smiling” by all employees at a service outlet, medical care of equal quality by several doctors at the same time, or even care of equal quality by the same doctor all the time.

When a service is bought — say, in the form of an airline ticket — the customer can know only in a very general way what to expect from the pilot and flight attendants. Knowing what to expect ahead of time is difficult, and often impossible. Heterogeneity leads service marketers to choose one of two alternative strategies- standardisation or customisation.

The Strategy of Standardisation because of the heterogeneous nature or services, mass marketers may choose a strategy to standardise the service offered. For example, although a hotel room at the Hyatt Regency in San Francisco may be slightly different from a hotel room in the San Antonio Hyatt Regency, the company has made a great attempt to standardise its services. At McDonald’s restaurants, all customers receive nearly the same courteous treatment.

The Strategy of Standardisation emphasises careful personnel selection and extensive personnel training. In selected situations, it is possible to standardise service by using machines. Thus, automated car washes or electronic funds transfer systems ensure that service quality does not vary.

Standardisation also emphasises marketing research to discover if service falls below established standards. The Strategy of Customisation In contrast to standardisation, a customisation strategy requires modifying or customising a service for each individual customer.

This occurs when the service is not mass produced, but individualised. A yacht may be chartered to visit any destination chosen by the customer. A health club’s fitness program may be customised to suit the customer’s desires and individual physical condition.

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Service Marketing – Goods versus Service Marketing

This is general agreement that inherent differences between goods and services and they result in unique or at least different management challenges for service business and for manufacturers that sell services as a core offering.

1. Intangibility:

The most basic and universally cited difference between goods and services is intangibility. Services are performances or actions rather than objects the services cannot actually be seen or touched but certain tangible components of services can be seen. This intangibility of presents several marketing challenges. Services cannot be inventoried while goods can be. As a result fluctuations in demand are often difficult to manage.

Services cannot be easily patented and new service concepts can be easily copied by customers while products can be patented so, new ideas can be copied by competitors. Service quality cannot be assessed by consumers as there is no standardisation in services. Advertising and other promotional materials are challenging in service firms whilst easier in product firm. Pride quality relationship is complex to determine.

2. Heterogeneity:

No two services are alike as services are delivered by people whose performances may differ and also from day-to-day and hour- to-hour, e.g., a doctor can provide different levels of diagnosis to two different people depending upon the degree of severity of disease. As services are heterogeneous ensuring consistent service quality is challenging. But product produced by a company is consistent in quality in one batch of production. Product cannot differ according to the needs and wants of a customer because products are standardised.

3. Simultaneity:

Goods are produced then sold and consumed but services are sold fist then produced and consumed simultaneously, e.g., an automobile is manufactured at a place, shipped to other place and then sold after two months in another place. But a restaurant services cannot be provided until sold and the dining experience is essentially produced and consumed at the same time. Because services are often produced and consumed at the same time mass production is difficult.

The quality of services and customer satisfaction is dependent on interaction between the employee and the customer. Unlike product services cannot be centralised as services are delivered directly to consumers in convenient locations and significant economies of scale cannot be achieved.

Due to simultaneously of productions and consumption the customer is involved in and observes the production process and thus may affect the outcome of service transactions, e.g., in a hotel an over demanding patron will command extra attention from the service provider and negativity impact the experiences of other customers.

4. Perishability:

It refers to the fact that services cannot be saved, stored, resold or returned, e.g., an airplane seat or a doctor’s appointment cannot be reclaimed or resold at a later time. Perishability makes this an unlikely possibility for most services. Perishability poses a major issue that marketers face due to the inability to inventory. Demand forecasting and creative planning is difficult in service unlike product. Strong recovery strategies are important as services cannot be resold.

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Service Marketing – Significance of Services in Marketing

After mid 90’s, service marketing firmly arose as a significant discipline of marketing, with its own research and data, and growing importance in the increasingly service sector dominated economies across the globe.

Service marketing first came to the force in the 1980’s when the debate started on whether marketing of service was significantly different from that of products so as to be classified as a separate discipline. Before that service were considered just an aid to the production and marketing of goods & therefore were not deemed as having separate relevance of their own.

Extensive studies and research is going on in the area of service marketing such as the product service spectrum, relationship marketing, franchising of services customer relation etc.

Some key points stating significance of services in marketing are given below:

1. For Satisfying Demand:

After satisfaction of basic needs, people tend towards satisfying luxurious needs. It is evident that India is now a service attentive economy with people demanding different types of services which were even not existed before e.g. hospitality service, cab service etc.

Thus services are pivotal for economic growth along with industry. Hence to cope with this increasing demand, marketing of services is important which will ultimately result in profit maximization.

2. Shut Down if no Service Offered:

Service is given as a part of a transaction and now a day’s whole transaction is of service only. Service includes customer satisfaction, loyalty of customer. Thus if industry in not keen about service, it will have to shut down its business in near future. Every industry is not ready only to produce and sell without service element.

3. Key Differentiator:

Product homogeneity is an increasing cause of concern which will be solved with service provided along with it. E.g. one of the two similar food chains are selected on the basics of services it offers, rather than food it prepares. Therefore service marketing is a key differentiator in today’s industrial growth.

4. Importance of Relationship Handling:

Marketing of service is closely associated with relationship as more people are closely related, since services are intangible, decision of customer is hugely dependent on behavior of seller and services he offered. Hence for customer retention, marketing department must make some briefings to its staff relating to customer relationships management.

5. Customer Retention:

Generally situation in market, there is one product and service, and many producer and many service providers.

How will customer take his baying decision? It must be based on other or secondary services given by service department of a particular organization. Thus service marketing offer greater scope for customization according to customer requirement, therefore receiving greater customer satisfaction leads to higher customer retention.

In India, service sector now accounts for 65 percent of gross domestic product. Innovative marketing practices in service industry thus may transform the socio-economic conditions of our country.

The significance of the service marketing may be discussed under the following headings:

i. Better Scope:

The scope of service sector is improving with lots of services associated with other tangible products as well. The overall performance of any of the product gets affected by the services associated with the same. In service sector the scope of personalization and customization is more. Therefore, the scope of improving the customer satisfaction level is more in service industry.

ii. Better Customer Relationships Management:

Relationships are a key factor when it comes to services marketing. Since services are intangible in nature, one of the most important factors affecting service quality is creating and maintaining good customer relationship. Therefore, it is very much important for the marketer to understand the needs of the customers to build long-term relationship.

iii. Customer Retention:

Services marketing plays a major role in building customer equity. Customer equity is to have a large pool of loyal customers for a long-term. As service quality depends on the interaction between the service provider and customer availing the service, it requires a lots of involvement and efforts to maintain the standards. The chances of improving the customer retention rate is high in service marketing because of direct interaction and possibility of personalized and customized services.

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Service Marketing – Types of Services

In context of business phenomenon, there are different services as managed and controlled either by an individual or a group of persons. Also, the services are associated by private owners or by government agencies. These services directly as well as indirectly promote or have a complementary role for business.

Some of the types of services are discussed below:

1. Business Services:

In order to promote the size and composition of different business activities there have emerged the signifying role of services. Whenever businessman try to earn profit through the means of services then the services may be included in the part of business. The businessmen coordinate the profit motives and service motive for the interest of business.

In this context the services have a signifying role to coordinate and develop business activities like trade and commerce to promote value additions, upgrade the quality levels, promote merchandising activities and expand the market shares. In business phenomenon, appropriate services may be able to increase the level of strength and opportunities and overcome the adverse situation of weaknesses and threats.

2. Personal Services:

On the basis of the concept of salesmanship the marketers may be able to create an ideology of personal services. Personal services develops the two way communization between service marketers and customers. It is based on different qualities like intelligences, good appearance, initiatives, integrity, ethical behaviour, sincerity, cooperativeness, social rationality and to follow the code of conducts.

There are different personal services as health care, electrician, plumbers, restaurants, technical assistance, beauty parlours and driving services etc. Today personal services have signifying and most decisional role in present state of service sector.

3. Professional Services:

In service sector, the professional services have been most important and decisional role. These services are based on specified knowledge, education, training and experience. It aims to achieve the profit as well as service motives of any organization. The role, contribution and attitudes of professional persons are required to follow several norms and provisions as laid down in the code of conducts of professionals.

These services may develop new avenues i.e. mannerism, behaviour, styles, values, intelligences and integrity by means of research, investigations and experiences. In service sector, the main professional services may be health care, counseling, tutoring, medical, technical, tax consultation, accounting, legal, computer services and maintenance etc.

4. Distribution Services:

In modern marketing systems the businessman as well as entrepreneurs have been providing several services within purview of distribution channels. Within it, in between manufacturer to consumers they provide several services like standardization, delivery of products, risk bearing, packaging, warehousing, transportation, business opportunities, credit sales, promotional services and grievance handling etc. These services are contributing to accelerate the merchandising environment in business.

5. Counselling Services:

When a person or a group of persons are performing the counselling or consulting services, they are called as consultants. Sometimes they have to be associated with some business houses. These services should be considered as the decisional aspects like policy formations, missions and objectives, situational analysis, behavioural view points and environmental factors etc.

These services may be managerial, organizational, project formation, market strategies, tax planning, and investment planning, medical and health care and domestic matters etc. Somehow in most of the cases, the counselling services are conducted by professionals.

6. Communication Services:

Communication is a vital and dynamic part of the organization. There are several forms of communication like on the basis of direction, scope, organization status and medias etc. in any organization. Besides, there are different types of communications like oral, written and verbal etc.

Some of the non-verbal communication systems also promote the services like visual symbols, body language, tele-communication, electronic media and internet services may be considered here. These services are needful to achieve certain targets like the knowledge of environment, develops reliability, promotional task, expertising services and motivational aspects in context of services. The major communication services are mobile, telephone, fax, radio, postal services and televisions etc.

7. Financial Services:

The financial sources are possibly the most important vehicle for economic transformation. Basically it aims to create and develop the ways and means to coordinate between savings and investment as well as to promote capital formation in our economy. There are several financial services as money lending, term deposits, credit facilities, tax consultation, mobilization of resources, charity, donations, auditing and multifarious investments etc. These services are being performed by an individual or a group of persons.

8. Banking and Insurance Services:

The Banking and Insurance services have been contributing towards multifarious developments in society. Their major services are to coordinate in between savings and investments, to provide different banking and insurance services, to develop the methods of capital formation, to develop resource mobilization and to raise the economic security and so on. Also, these services develops the concurrent platform to create and develop the level and composition of economic resources.

9. Advertising Services:

In modern business, there are different persons and group of persons who have been engaged to serve by means of advertising. The effectiveness of advertising medias are proved as creator of business performance. The advertising services may create and develop the business attitudes and behaviour by the basic concept of social values, creativity, rationality, responsiveness and truthfulness. These services are most beneficial and decisional towards making promotional activities more effective.

10. Public Services:

Public services have emerged with the concept of welfare state and associated to protect human rights. The aims of them are to create and develop true and fair service performance with devotion, integrity, loyalty and sense of humour in the society. The major public services are under the management and control of civil administration at the local authorities.

The major services are civil administration, municipal services, public works, public health, and engineering water and electricity supply transportation, public administration and security etc. These services determine a long lasting path towards the concept of welfare state.

11. Medical Services:

The medical services are governed and controlled either by government or private sector. These services are inevitably more concerned with the civil norms and administration. The medical services have focus on four major areas in respect of patients and their diseases. The areas are consultations, proper investigation, treatment and medicines and drugs. The people of our society are required to get fair and justified behaviour, prompt services, human values, most mannerism attitudes and non-exploitation attitudes from medical services.

12. Tourism Services:

Tourism services are regarded as the extensive, largest and rapidly growing in global world. Tourism acts as a major leader of economic growth. There are different types of tourism services as ethnical, historical, religious, cultural, adventure and recreation etc. We can consider various tourism services as available at tourist spots like health care, boating, recreations, bar, restaurants, cultural events and water parks etc. We should protect and utilize these services by means of ethical norms and conducts.

13. Transport Services:

Transport is the combination of all mechanical means and organization which assists persons and goods from one place to another place. It is included in the category of business services. There are major means of transport like road or land, air and water etc. applicable as transport services in our country.

14. Entertainment Services:

With the new and emerging trends of standard of living as well as growing role of youth in society, the entertainment of services have emerged. Every person is required to acquire more and more entertainment services at their possible level. Presently the video, cinema, theater, WhatsApp dramas and circus are the major services available.

15. Postal Services:

Postal Services has been very old and most appropriate services in our society. The major postal services may include correspondence, saving, investment and transfer of money etc. The postal services have a big network to promote different services like communication, commodity transportation and savings and investment. The expansion and development of postal services contributes in the development of business.

16. Legal Services:

Legal services are also an important and decisional services in society. They are contributing different laws and regulations to create and establish fair and equitable behaviour and responses in our society. They also contributes different provisions and guidelines to make an ideal citizen and to protect the dignity of our constitution.

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Service Marketing – Approaches towards Service Marketing Environment

Within service marketing, there are several environmental factors that directly or indirectly affects the marketing and its allied activities. There are several value based approaches to be based on service norms and motives as desired by society.

These approaches that might be contributed towards their most signifying role are summarized here:

Approach # 1. Education and Literacy:

Education and literacy are important ingredients of sociological environment. The service organizations may create and develop the attitudes and awareness about mass literacy programmes in society. They can organize and manage the wide literacy programmes, skill development programmes, management education, training for employees, time management and develop the learning attitudes among employees to make cordial business and organization culture.

Approach # 2. Social Values and Attitudes:

Social value and attitudes also play a major role towards the upliftment of the society. The customs, traditions and assumptions are no longer rigid, but may be flexible. Here the service organizations may create and develop the sociological environment to emphasize more and more on social values and attitudes instead of undesirable and inhuman social practices by means of interactive programmes.

Approach # 3. Opportunities for Growth:

For the well-being of society, there is a need to raise higher economic growth, better spread of infrastructure, job opportunities, better skill development and industrial diversification. It is required to establish and develop the small business units, solar energy plants, agro based units, waste management system and infrastructural facilities in context of environmental upgradations in society.

Approach # 4. Expanding Markets:

With the growing trends of innovative services and techniques, the expansion of market and its opportunities may also be developed. In order to expand and develop new markets, it is most required to make and adopt new technological process, better quality, service network, cost reductions, effective resource utilization, most consumerism and direct marketing etc. These translate into greater service attributes and values for consumers.

Approach # 5. Eradication the Social Problems:

There are several social problems in our society. Some of them are old customs, traditions, dowry system, women exploitation, child marriage, growing unemployment and poverty, poor housing and sanitation, urban congestion, pollution and increasing incidents of antisocial activities. Within service marketing we may adopt the social consciousness and social reforms to overcome these problems.

Approach # 6. Proper Implementation of Law and Legal Aspects:

Different laws, rules and legal aspects have a profound impact on decisions concerning the multi various operations in business as it touches the very existence and legality of business firms. The law and legal provisions must be followed to control over the unethical, unfair and antisocial transactions. The efficiency and efficacy of legal provisions determine adequacy, promptness, economic justice and as such, these are of great importance for the growth of business.

Approach # 7. Utilization of Resources:

Within the environmental situation, it is the foremost responsibility of service marketers to make most appropriate and better utilization of resources. The technological upgradation, innovations, re-engineering and economies of scale are much important in this context. Moreover by way of utilitarian and ethical approaches, the available resource must be utilized in proper ways for the well- being of society.

Approach # 8. Customization:

A service organization basically exists for the customers and all its activities have to be customer-focused. The marketers have to follow some ethical norms and value-oriented behavior with their customers. They seek to build and maintain good customer relation by maximizing consumer satisfaction and consumer care services.

Approach # 9. Organization Development:

Organization development is a planned process to improve organizational effectiveness and performance. In order to overcome the challenges as arising out of environmental threats, the systems and methods of organization development may be based on interaction between individual and group, group dynamism relations, consultation services and sensitivity training etc.

All these methods should be designed on the concept of environmental awareness and consciousness. Besides, the better and efficient performance, more or less, depends on the mental preparedness and abilities of our manpower in any organization.

Approach # 10. Work Culture:

In any organization, culture is a social phenomenon and has an uncalculated value. The working environment of business must be based on humanitarian ground and the values for good human relations are needful. It should be based on the feelings of employees by ethical soundness, purity, devotion, coordination, non-jealous, non-violence and responsiveness etc.

Approach # 11. Managerial Leadership Style:

Leadership is the quality of behavior and to guide the people to move some desired goals. In order to make some useful practices through leadership styles for betterment in organization, the methods and devices like unity of command, informal relations, democratic styles, confidence, enthusiasm, team spirit, high morale, sociability and self-motivation may be followed.

Approach # 12. Management of Change:

Within the dynamic environmental scenario, there are several changes in service qualities and performance. The environmental changes may be favourable, unfavourable, internal, external, visible, non-visible, short term and long term etc. Any how they must be in favour of the people and society. The process of management of change is to be followed by knowing the causes of change, formation of plans, analyze the resistance, overcoming resistance, implementing the change and fruitful results from the changes etc.

Approach # 13. Pollution Control:

In order to make proper environmental protection, it is needful to adopt different methods and techniques for control over the pollution in society. The air, water and noise pollutions can easily be controlled by different ways of technical operations and somehow by the ethical responsiveness with the society.

Approach # 14. Emphasise on Innovations and Research:

In order to overcome the problems and challenges in service environment, we should consider to create innovative ideas and concepts. It includes to search out new design, new pattern, new parameters, new styles and preferences of services. More over there is a need to develop and motivate the research programme in resource conservation, quality standard, manufacturing process, maintenance of plants and equipments and corrective measures for different environmental pollutions.

Approach # 15. Waste Management:

Within technological advancements, the concepts and methods of waste management are very important to control over the environment problems. Waste may be called as a material that has no value and that may be any garbage, refuse, sludge and other discarded material.

They have negative impact on the environment and are proved to be hazardous for human life. Some of the wastes are food wastes, scrap materials, cardboards, chemical wastes, plastics, wooden items, used tube and tyres, etc. We should manage and organize to discharge the wastes particularly by street sweeping drain cleaning, disposal of waste material, composting and incineration etc.

Approach # 16. Protection of Human Rights:

In order to create and develop the social well-being in our society, it is the responsibility of service marketers to protect the human right. Ethically the businessmen provide fair wages to their employees on justified ground. They may also provide the norms and regulations as per the Acts and rules. They may protect the child labour system and women workers in respect of their working hours, heavy and hazardous task. Over all we should pay proper response to the constitutional rights and privileges of every citizen in country.

Approach # 17. Customers Relationship:

It is needful to emphasise on the ways and means to upgrade the level of customers’. The service organization may adopt the methods of customers’ retention, customers’ acquisition, customers’ loyalty and satisfaction. The relationship patterns might be able to overcome the problems as arising out of environmental threats.

Approach # 18. Customers Driven Strategies:

In service marketing the strategies should be determined in context of customer’ orientation and preferences. The strategies may be concerned with the price, quality, performance, design and operational aspects. The business plans and strategies should be based on customers’ orientation. Big business houses like Dell computers, Reliance and LG groups have been introduced the strategies in the light of customers preferences.

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Service Marketing – Role

Marketing is an art and science of selling goods and services to customers, with a difference. The feature of services makes it different and carries a variant value. The marketing of a product base business is different from marketing a service- base business. Basically ‘commerce’ is defined as an activity with trade and ‘aids to trade’. Here, aids to trade are supporting activities to trade, such as – banking, warehousing, transportation, insurance etc. When ‘banking’ is considered as – ‘services’ its product itself is service, which has to be marketed with all due care.

Hence, both the categories i.e., services after selling a product and selling purely services play an important role in marketing business. The ‘health-care’ services are a service marketing, which has to develop its own market and render the services. Recent years have witnessed tremendous growth in service industry. The changing life style is attracting a large share of consumer spending to get services.

In most of the district / Taluka places, we could see a multi- speciality hospital. People are spending more than of half of their earnings on services itself. The changing needs of customers, dynamic environment, lifestyle, innovations, etc., have made the market as customer service oriented.

The following factors support the role of services marketing in recent years:

1. Support in Relationship Building:

Marketing if successfully done gets the customers repeatedly, one time sale is not a good strategy for all types of goods. For examples, in markets you are finding shops entitled ‘Chaina Bazar – Buy any one at Rs. 65’. Here most of the customers are one time purchasers; never go to buy the same. But, it won’t build customers. After selling a car, how much care the company takes for its proper maintenance is more important and matters a lot for both company and customer.

Once the customer enters the lodging premises how best care is taken for him builds a healthy relationship. Indirectly, services marketing achieve the objective of customer welfare.

2. Establishing the Value:

The basic difference between the goods and services is in the physical existence. For example, if a customer is going to a five star hotel for halting a day, it charges him around Rs. 20,000/- at the end of the day, what the customer possess? Nothing, except the happiness of the day stay. Can he compare with a mobile of Rs. 20,000/- value to a day’s stay? Can he say that, instead of a day stay, had he gone for a mobile, it could be enjoyed for a year! It is the difference.

3. Service Value:

The role of services marketing lies in establishing its value. Usually, the consumers have hard time in justifying the costs of services because they don’t go away with anything tangible in their hands. In recent, years rich people going for ‘Panchakarma Ayurvedic Treatment’ are receiving attraction even with heavy fees.

After 10 days of treatment, what do they carry? But, in market there are numbers of hospitals offering ‘Panchakarma’ at different packages. Hence, services by defining them as a value offer or a premium offer. You can also make out the difference between learning MBA from IIM Bangalore and from other university! Therefore, role of service marketing lies with matching the services to the customer’s profile.

4. Create Brand Awareness:

Service marketing creates its own brand image in the market. Service organizations need to be differentiated. People buy the goods but remember the relations. Service marketing bridges the gap. In manufacturing industry value is added at every step in the process, from raw- material to finished product, in many service industries the value is a perceived value which is delivered by the services. The value addition would be understood by a customer through the created brand. It is the services, which create brand awareness in the market.

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Service Marketing – 12 Standard Attributes of Services

Any service can be completely, consistently and clearly specified by means of the following 12 standard attributes:

The meaning and content of these attributes are:

1. Service Consumer Benefits:

Service Consumer Benefits describe the (set of) benefits which are callable, receivable and effectively utilizable for any authorized service consumer and which are provided to him as soon as he requests the offered service. The description of these benefits must be phrased in the terms and wording of the intended service consumers.

2. Service-Specific Functional Parameters:

Service-specific Functional Parameters specify the functional parameters which are essential and unique to the respective service and which describe the most important dimension of the service output, e.g., maximum e-mailbox capacity per registered and authorized e-mail service consumer.

3. Service Delivery Point:

Service Delivery Point describes the physical location and/or logical interface where the benefits of the service are made accessible, callable and receivable to the authorized service consumers. At this point and/or interface, the preparedness for service delivery can be assessed as well as the effective delivery of the service itself can be monitored and controlled.

4. Service Consumer Count:

Service Consumer Count specifies the number of intended, identified, named, registered and authorized service consumers which are allowed and enabled to call and utilize the defined service for executing and/or supporting their business tasks or private activities.

5. Service Readiness Times:

Service Readiness Times specify the distinct agreed times of day when –

i. The described service consumer benefits are –

a. Accessible and callable for the authorized service consumers at the defined service delivery point.

b. Receivable and utilizable for the authorized service consumers at the respective agreed service level.

ii. All service-relevant processes and resources are operative and effective.

iii. All service-relevant technical systems are up and running and attended by the operating team.

iv. The specified service benefits are comprehensively delivered to any authorized requesting service consumer without any delay or friction.

v. The time data are specified in 24 h format per local working day and local time, referring to the location of the intended service consumers.

6. Service Support Times:

Service Support Times specify the determined and agreed times of day when the usage and consumption of the contracted services is supported by the service desk team for all identified, registered and authorized service consumers within the service customer’s organizational unit or area.

The service desk is the single point of contact for any service consumer inquiry regarding the contracted and delivered services. During the defined service support times, the service desk can be reached by phone, e-mail, web-based entries and/or fax, respectively. The time data are specified in 24 h format per local working day and local time, referring to the location of the intended service consumers.

7. Service Support Languages:

Service Support Languages specifies the languages which are spoken by the service desk team(s) to the service consumers calling them.

8. Service Fulfillment Target:

Service Fulfillment Target specifies the service provider’s promise of effective and seamless delivery of the defined benefits to any authorized service consumer requesting the service within the defined service times. It is expressed as the promised minimum ratio of the counts of successful individual service deliveries related to the counts of called individual service deliveries.

The effective service fulfillment ratio can be measured and calculated per single service consumer or per consumer group and may be referred to different time periods (workday, calendar-week, work-month, etc.).

9. Maximum Impairment Duration per Incident:

Maximum Impairment Duration per Incident specifies the allowable maximum elapsing time [hh:mm] between –

i. The first occurrence of a service impairment, i.e., service quality degradation or service delivery disruption, whilst the service consumer consumes and utilizes the delivered service.

ii. And the full resumption and complete execution of the service delivery to the content of the affected service consumer.

10. Service Delivering Duration:

Service Delivering Duration specifies the promised and agreed maximum period of time for effectively delivering all specified service consumer benefits to the requesting service consumer at the defined service delivery point.

11. Service Delivery Unit:

Service Delivery Unit specifies the basic portion for delivering the defined service consumer benefits. The service delivery unit is the reference and mapping object for all cost for service generation and delivery as well as for charging and billing the consumed service volume to the service customer who has ordered the service delivery.

12. Service Delivering Price:

Service Delivering Price specifies the amount of money the service customer has to pay for the consumption of distinct service volumes.

Normally, the service delivering price comprises two portions:

i. A fixed basic price portion for basic efforts and resources which provide accessibility and usability of the service delivery functions, i.e. service access price.

ii. A price portion covering the service consumption based on.

iii. Fixed flat rate price per authorized service consumer and delivery period without regard on the consumed service volumes.

iv. Staged prices depending on consumed service volumes.

v. Fixed price per particularly consumed service delivering unit.

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Service Marketing – Environmental Factors Affecting Service Marketing

Impact of Environmental Factors on Service Marketing:

There are different environmental factors which influence the phenomenon of service marketing.

Out of them, the internal and external factors are as important as stated here:

1. Internal Factors:

The important internal factors which have a bearing on the strategy and other service decisions are outlined below:

i. The Values and Ethical Norms – The values and ethical norms of the promoters and those at the helm of affairs has important bearing on the choice of service objectives, policies and practices. It is widely accepted fact that the extent to which the value system is shared by all organization is an important factor contributing to success.

ii. The Market Policies and Objectives – The market policies and objectives also affect the plans and operational procedures as laid down by service organization. The service performance, working priorities, direction of development, service policy and guidelines are guided by visions and mission as well as policies and objectives.

iii. The Organization Structure – The organization structure, composition of line and staff, span of control, inter relationship of employees, mutual coordination and the level of rights and responsibility among employees are important factors influencing service performance.

iv. Market Planning – The market plans also determine the market resources, time tested programmes, market segments, target market, short and long term targets, customers’ mobility and acquisition and market shares that duly influence the service performance.

v. Expertising Services – The expertise services like availability of technical resources, experts of service parameters, different service experts and specialisation also influence service availability and its performance.

vi. Quality of Human Resources – The characteristics of the human resources like skill, quality, efficiency, mannerism, loyalty and commitments could contribute to the strength and weakness of a service organization. The quality of employees duly effects on service performance.

vii. General Working – In service organization the general working, process, coordination, supervision, control and organization culture may also influence an internal set up of the concern.

viii. Organization Culture – The organization culture which is the set of values, attitudes, behavior, commitment, morale, beliefs, trust, responsiveness and devotion may also be influenced by the service environment.

ix. Technological Development – The technical and technological development in context of resource conservation, waste minimization, by product recovery, cooling system and air purification etc. affects the methods, systems, process and working of service organization.

x. Effective Communication – In any organization, sound and effective communication system has also influenced the working of it. The fair and justified vertical and horizontal communication process are an important part of the organization.

xi. Organization Development – The programmes of organization development concerning the aspects of human resource development also influence the working environment of the organization. It stimulates the learning attitudes as well as employees’ productivity also.

xii. Quality Parameters – The availability and applicability of quality parameters are also an important part in service performance. The process of quality upgradation are decisional way in environmental scenario.

xiii. Financial Factors – The financial factors like financial policies, source of finance, financial position and capital structure are also important internal environment affecting service performance and strategies.

xiv. Physical Assets – The physical assets and facilities and the efficiency of the productive apparatus, production and service tasks, skill parameters, non-mechanical process are due effects on service performance.

2. External Factors:

The external environmental factors are briefly stated here:

i. Economic Environment – Economic environment covers those factors which give shape and form to the development of economic activities and may include factors like sources of economic resources, nature of economic system, economic status and various economic policies.

ii. Monetary Values – The monetary value of economic activities also determine the purchasing power of people and consequently the demand of the services. The role and composition of national income also effects and determine the choice and preferences of services qualities.

iii. Natural Resources – The availability of natural resources, land, minerals, fuel and soil – becomes a strategic planning factor for organizations requiring such resources in service process. It is required to make it effectively useful for organizations purpose.

iv. Plant and Equipment’s – The availability of plant and equipment depends on the locational factors, technical feasibility and infrastructure facilities. They duly affects the technical development and resource allocations.

v. Political and Legal Environment – Political and legal environment is also an important element and influence the service operations. There are certain aspects of political environment as well as legal provisions and restrictions particularly for service sectors as imposed on them.

vi. Customers’ Orientation – Any business organization basically exists for the customers and all its activities have to be customer oriented and focused. The excellences of service performance are duly based on product and service quality, maintenance, replacement, retention and customers satisfaction. The service organization should be concerned about the changing requirements of its customers and should keep in touch with this changing need of customers.

vii. Competitive Environment- Competitive environment is the most relevant for service organization. This has changed and influenced the approaches and acceptability of specified services in society. Service marketers may try to develop competitive advantages for customers in competitive service performance.

viii. Environment of Change- The environment of change also influences the composition and parameters of services. The change may be a path for the prosperity of consumers. The changing customer’s preferences may be useful in service-marketing.

ix. Market Intermediaries – The market intermediaries include distributors and agents who also influence the different tasks of service performance. They may contribute in value additions, service standards, service quality maintenance, consultation services and proper service delivery etc.

x. Technological Advancement – The technological development is also important for service organization. It facilitates some new and innovative ideas in service design, service quality and service parameters.

xi. Social and Cultural Environment – Social and cultural environment is quite comprehensive because it may include the total social factors within which an organization operates. It is closely intertwined with the new ideas, viewpoints, liking and disliking of the service performance.

xii. Core Area of Market Segmentation – There are different core areas like geographic, demographic, cultural, psychographic, occasional, benefit and usage segmentation which may duly affect the needs, requirements, and preferences of service customers.

Socio-Cultural Environment – Core Area:

The socio-cultural environment in our society have direct and most decisional influence on service performance. Quite a major part of service organization are influenced and determined by the socio-cultural environment. In order to make and develop some better opportunities and to utilize the environmental segments properly, the impact and role of several socio-cultural values are summarized here –

1. The socio-cultural values’ provides and determine some norms and standards for the betterment in service standards and performance.

2. Socio-cultural values ethically and collectively denotes the motivational and inspirational ideologies and provide directional view points for service organization.

3. Socio-cultural values have the signifying role to determine the ways and means for services towards betterments in social life.

4. Socio-cultural values are accepted by society due to their determinant of trust, honesty and integrity among them.

5. Socio-cultural values are linked with inner feelings and emotions of people and somehow they protect the group benefits rather than the individual benefits.

6. Socio cultural values change and refine the ideology, opinion, concepts and views of persons to make well-being of society, through services.

7. Socio cultural values determine the norms of right or wrong, good or bad behavior for congenial and rational behavior.

8. Socio-cultural values provide the morale and norms of human behavior towards the goodness of human life on the ground of services.

9. Socio-cultural values provide the value based norms and ideology to utilize the resources and to control over the environmental problems.

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Service Marketing – Factors Influencing Consumer Expectations of Services

It is a natural tendency amongst people to keep expectations. Similarly, even with service providers, people have high expectations from them under various conditions. Marketers are working hard to find out as to what are the factors that actually shape up a buyer’s expectations and in what ways they can control the same. However, it is also true that not all the factors are controllable or easy to manage.

Basically, there are three major sources of customer’s expectations of service.

These have been fairly further sub-divided as described below:

1. Sources of Desired Service Expectations:

Philosophies and personal needs about service are the two main influences on desired service expectations.

(i) Personal Needs:

Personal needs are the main factors which decide what a customer expects from the service. As per his personal needs and wants he will be demanding the desired service. It is counted under various categories like social needs, physical needs and psychological needs.

All the customers are different in nature and thus they are divided into various categories like a demanding customer, sensitive customer, angry customer, easy going ones and more. Thus based on their personal characteristics and wants they are grouped under various titles.

For example, if a person who wants to watch a movie straight after work, will automatically expect a quality food and beverages counter as well to fetch when he is hungry and tired. However, a person who has eaten well before the movie may not expect such services as he will be straight going in for the movie and back home.

(ii) Lasting Service Intensifiers:

Lasting service intensifies are also known as derived service expectations because here a customer’s expectations are usually derived by another customer or a group of people. It involves some stable and individual factors which leads the customer to a heightened sensitivity of service.

In an example of business-to-business service, when the software crashes or when the computer equipment is not working, the customers of the insurance company pressurize the departmental head to work on the same at the earliest. Thus, in such cases, a manager or supervisor is forced by his customers to fulfil their expectations and this brings in the desired service expectations.

In similar cases, subordinates speed up their project work when they are pressurised by their managers. The sales staff will run helter-skelter to increase their sales after being pressurised by their company.

Usually, people who are in the service industry tend to have strong service philosophies and thus their expectations are also equally high. Many people also have their own personal philosophies in regards to the service industries which drive their expectations to various levels.

2. Sources of Adequate Service Expectations:

There are various factors that affect adequate service and the level of service at which a customer finds satisfaction. Generally, these are all short-term influences and they tend to fluctuate even more than the actual desired service.

Following are the five main factors that influence adequate services:

i. Temporary service intensifiers,

ii. Perceived service alternatives,

iii. Customer self-perceived service role,

iv. Situational factors, and

v. Predicted service

i. Temporary Service Intensifiers:

In temporary service intensifiers, there are individual and short-term factors that arise out of the needs for service amongst people. For example, when there is an accident, or when there is a need for car insurance or when there is a breakdown of computer systems during the peak hours of the day, then the level of adequate service expectations rises automatically.

Level of responsiveness and problems with the first time service may also increase the expectations of adequate service. For example, when the service fails for the first time, then there are even higher hopes and restlessness for the second time of service. Thus, in such cases of temporary service intensifiers, there is an increase in the levels of adequate service and even the tolerance zone will narrow down.

ii. Perceived Service Alternatives:

Perceived service alternatives are the other available options that a customer can consider when in need. If there are multiple options to choose from for quality service or when a person can work for himself then they have high expectations for quality and adequate service.

However, when a person does not have much option in the market to choose from, then he will not complain much and will adjust to any kind of service available for the moment. For example, a person who is staying in a small town with a nearby airport option will consider only that option as compared to a person who is from a big city and thus have multiple options to choose from.

In this, when options are available the expectations for quality and adequate service increases and even the tolerance level zeroes down. Thus, it is very important for the marketers to understand the available options and why people will prefer them than theirs. Accordingly, they will be able to justify their services by fulfilling the demands of the customers within the expected time period.

iii. Customer’s Self-Perceived Service Role:

This is a third factor, wherein a customer himself decides the adequacy level of service. If he is highly involved in the service process then his expectations also increase and gets dissatisfied if the service does not meet his expectations. Whereas, if the customer is not much involved in the service process and leaves the entire case to the service providers then his expectations will remain low and he will be mostly happy and satisfied with what he gets.

In other words, expectations of a customer are partly shaped by how well they believe that their personal involvement is equally important. For example, when a customer in a restaurant makes special orders about how he wants his steak to be cooked then there are high chances of his dissatisfaction when it does actually turn up the way he desired.

On the other hand, when a customer simply orders for what he wants and does not actually get involved as to how it is to be cooked, then his expectation levels also decreases and he will be happy the way it will be as he didn’t give any special orders to cook the same.

A customer usually takes up the responsibility of complaining if the service is poor and this factor decides the adequate levels of service. Similarly, a person who is very particular about the regular servicing of his vehicle will have high expectations from the manufacturer if anything goes wrong, whereas a person who does not follow the servicing schedule of the vehicle may not even voice his opinion or concern when things go wrong with it.

Thus, a dissatisfied customer who always complains will be less tolerant as compared to the one who does not bother much about the minute details.

Customers’ tolerance zone will expand when they realise that they are not being fully responsible in the service process and not doing their part well, whereas, the tolerance zone will contract when a customer is justifying his role in the entire process.

For example, when a customer says that the vehicle servicing staff does not listen to him completely which affects the work, will make a list of handwritten notes of the things to be done. By doing this, they believe that the staff will act responsibly and thus their expectation level increases as compared to the one who didn’t take the same measures.

iv. Situational Factors:

Situational factors are temporary and short-term emergencies due to which a customer believes and accepts that the service quality may not be adequate as it is out of the employee’s control.

For example, during catastrophes (floods or storms) that affect a large number of people at the same time, the pressure on the insurance company increases which frames a picture in people’s minds that the adequacy service levels drops down due to the overcrowded demand.

Customers realise that it is not the company’s fault but the natural emergencies which leads to delayed or low quality service and hence they will automatically lower their expectation levels. In general, when the expectation levels are lowered down the tolerance levels increase simultaneously.

v. Predicted Service:

In predicted service, a customer predicts as to what kind of service he will get and thus his expectation levels fluctuate accordingly. For example, a customer will expect poor service from the no-frill airlines as compared to the full- cost airlines. Thus, he predicts the situation and is mentally prepared to receive poor service.

Similarly, during festival times, a customer is mentally prepared that the call centre of mobile phone companies will render poor service at the said time as compared to the other regular days. This is because during the festival times, a lot of people are setting in their new services for mobiles which they have received as gifts.

Thus, in such cases the tolerance zone widens and the level of adequate service also decreases.

3. Sources of both Desired and Predicted Service Expectations:

Considering the above illustration, it highlights a group of four factors on the right-hand side that influence both the desired as well as predicted service expectations.

They have been explained below:

(i) Explicit Service Performances:

An organisation advertises and promises a lot by making face-to-face and indirect statements to their customers. Face-to-face statements are the ones that act as personal communication with customers like a salesperson or a help-desk or a receptionist of the company giving out information.

Indirect promises are non-personal communications with customers like TV advertisements, newspaper articles, mass media and public speech. It is obvious, that the statements made by the organisation, whether personal or non-personal, is surely under their control.

These explicit service promises made by the organisations actually influence the desired service expectations in customers. Many a times, organisations make big promises in public but fail in fulfilling them. Explicit service promises influence both the levels of desired service as well as the predicted service thus also influencing the adequate service level expectations.

(ii) Implicit Service Performances:

Various service related cues like price of the product decides the expectation levels about the quality of its services. Many a times, people believe that higher the price of the product or service better will be the quality of the same. Thus, they relate such factors to each other which form a base for driving the desired service level.

(iii) Word-of-Mouth Communications:

People believe a lot in taking feedbacks from others before buying anything. Thus references and word-of-mouth communications amongst buyers influences the expected service levels to a great extent.

(iv) Past Experience:

Past experience of buyers also majorly influences the desired and predicted service levels. This is a form of direct comparison which a buyer makes with his past experience if he has received poor services. For example, if a patient has had a bad experience with some medical practitioner then he may have low desires and can predict his future visit based on the last one.

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Service Marketing – Customer Perception of Services

For gaining sustainable competitive advantage these perceptions are becoming much more important, in today’s competitive marketplace. The perceptions of the customers are influenced by a variety of factors.

The perceptions of the customer will shift from fact-based judgements to a more general. Meaning the whole relationship gains for him once he gains more experience. Over time, he puts a stronger focus on the consequence of the product or service consumption.

When moving from the area of goods to services, handling of consumer perception becomes more complex. It has been researched that it becomes difficult for consumers to evaluate “quality” when it comes to service. Since services are intangible, perishable, and have no preset physical standards, the customer may form perceptions based on ideal expectations. The supplier too forms a perception of what is adequate.

Take for example a family booking a holiday with a tour operator. The tour operator did not inform the customer of some exclusions and limitations in the package before the tour commenced. The consumer on his part had his own high expectations.

When he found out once the tour commenced that there were limitations to the package, he perceived the entire tour as unsatisfactory. Tourists who had earlier experiences along these lines however did not have such expectations and their perceptions were positive.

Perceptions and Brand:

Brand identity helps in making the consumer remember the association of the brand with quality and speeds up the purchase decision. This sets high expectations from the customers as he wants to make sure the service is the same or higher and any shortcoming will not be forgiven or forgotten by the customer. The golden principle in this for marketers is that they should offer only quality products when a brand is invoked.

Consumer Perception of Risks:

Customers recognise some amount of risks when purchase decisions are taken, though concerns about these risks are not often expressed. Even after a transaction is completed without any risks materialising, the consumer may carry the perception that there were risks.

Some of these risks are:

1. Functional risk of the product not performing as expected.

2. Financial risk of having paid a higher price than necessary.

3. Risk of effort and time being wasted consequent to a possible product failure. Sellers must follow up any successful transaction so that a repeat purchase is in store in the future.

Playing Trumps:

One is bound to find consumers who have difficulty in making choices due to the risks which are involved, hence in these cases, it is up to the sales executive to be able to guide the consumer.

He could-

1. Ascertain their real needs and suggest products that can meet these needs.

2. Encourage consumers to rely on the brand.

3. Give honest brand comparisons.

4. Explain the scope and limitations of after-sales-service and warranties.

5. When in doubt, play trumps. Recommend only the best, setting aside the cost factors.

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Service Marketing – Variables and Marketing Strategies

Services have to be sold keeping three variables in mind.

These variables and their relationships can be represented as:

1. Internal Marketing:

Marketing by a service firm to train and effectively motivate its customer contact employees and all the supporting service people to work as a team to provide customer satisfaction.

2. Inter Active Marketing:

Marketing by a service firm that recognises that perceived service quality depends heavily on the quality of buyer seller interaction.

3. External Marketing:

Marketing by a service firm to external customers i.e. customers outside the company.

The strategies to be adopted are:

1. Service Profit Chain:

The chain that links service firms profits with employee and customer satisfaction.

This chain consists of:

Internal service quality – i.e. quality selection, training, work environment, support etc. which leads to satisfied and productive service employee leading to Greater service value leading to satisfied and loyal customers leading to healthy service profits and growth.

2. Managing Product Differentiation:

The solution to price competition is to develop a differentiated Offer, Delivery and Image.

(i) Offer:

Innovative features.

(ii) Delivery:

a. More able and reliable customer contact people

b. Designing a superior delivery process

c. Developing a superior physical environment in which the service product is delivered.

(iii) Image:

a. Symbols

b. Branding

3. Managing Service Quality:

One of the major ways a service firm can differentiate itself is by delivering consistently higher quality than its competitors do.

(i) Good service recovery – Can turn every customer into loyal ones.

(ii) Empower front line service employees through –

a. Authority

b. Responsibility

c. Care

d. Incentives

(iii) Watch service performance closely.

(iv) Communicate concerns about service quality to employees and provide performance feedback.

4. Managing Service Productivity:

(i) Train current employees better.

(ii) Hire new one who work harder or more skillfully.

(iii) Increase quantity of service by compromising quality.

(iv) Harness the power of technology.

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Service Marketing – Service Marketing Mix (With Examples)

Services are usually produced delivered and consumed simultaneously, therefore, customers are often present during this process. They interact directly with the firm’s personnel, and are actually part of the service production process. Also, because services are intangible, customers often look for any tangible elements to help them understand the nature of the service experience.

For example, in the hotel industry the design and decor of the hotel as well as the appearance and attitudes of its employees will influence customer perceptions and experiences.

The music and ambience along with the food and service provided by employees in Hard Rock Cafe influences the service experience for their customer.

For Virgin Atlantic airlines- the airplane, the comfortable seats, the in-flight entertainment and the employees- steward or stewardess influence the customer’s perception of the service provided.

Acknowledgment of the importance of these additional variables has led services marketers to adopt the concept of an expanded marketing mix for services.

In addition to the traditional 4Ps, the services marketing mix includes:

1. People,

2. Physical Evidence, and

3. Process.

1. People:

In the words of Dr. Zeithaml; a pioneer in the field of services marketing, ‘People’ are- All human actors who play a part in service delivery and thus influence the buyer’s perception.

According to the definition the ‘people’ include the following:

i. Service delivery employees (front-line staff)

ii. The general staff of the service company (back office and support staff)

iii. The customer

iv. The other customers that are present in the ‘servuction’ and delivery process.

All the human actors participating in the delivery of, a service provide evidences to the customer regarding the nature of the service itself. The customer’s perceptions of the service is influenced by factors such as – how these people are dressed, their personal appearance, their attitudes and behaviours. The service provider or contact person can be very important.

In fact, for some services, such as – consulting, counselling, teaching, and other professional relationship-based services, the provider is the service. In other cases the contact person may play what appears to be a relatively small part in service delivery —for example, a telephone installer, an airline baggage handler and receptionist at a hair salon.

Yet according to various research conducted it is observed that even these providers may be the focal point of service encounters that can prove critical for the organization.

In many service situations, customers themselves can also influence service delivery, thus affecting service quality and their own satisfaction. For example, patient at a weight loss clinic will affect the quality of the service provided by the company by following or not following the diet regime.

Customers not only influence their own service outcomes, but they can influence other customers as well. In a theater or in a classroom, customers can influence the quality of service received by others — either enhancing or detracting from other customers’ experiences. One may not be able to enjoy a movie or pay attention in a class if one is distracted by unnecessary talking of the other customers or classmates.

Hence, as a service provider, it is important to understand human behaviour and dynamics to enhance customer satisfaction. Proper training and guidance should be given to the service employees. The customers need to be educated and made aware of the importance of their role in delivery of the service. This helps the service provider and customer both and makes the service experience positive.

2. Physical Evidence:

Physical evidence is the environment in which the service is delivered and where the firm and customer interact, and any tangible components that facilitate performance or communication of the service. The physical evidence of service includes all the tangible representations of the service such as elements which create the ambience where the service is provided, brochures, and equipment. In some cases it includes the physical facility where the service is offered —the “services cape” — for example, the retail bank branch facility.

In other cases, such as – telecommunication services, the physical facility may be of less importance. In this case other tangibles such as billing statements may be important indicators of quality.

The service ‘setting’ or ‘design’ represents the philosophy behind the service and the provider. Is it formal or informal service? Is it up-scale or budget? Is the service personal or intended for the masses? These questions are answered by the setting of the service.

For example- Looking at the decor, style and arrangement of chairs and tables and the in-house posters customers know that McDonald’s is an informal and ‘fun’ type of fast food restaurant. In Mainland China, the decor and service setting describes the restaurant as up-scale and formal.

In general, the service setting includes the various features that surround the service interaction between the service provider and the customers. For example- In a Theatre where drama or play is show cased the props, costumes and stage decoration are used along with curtains and back drops to create ‘effect’ and add value to the quality of the drama or play.

This also helps the audience to understand and follow the flow of the play. These are the physical elements which enhance the service (entertainment provided by the play). Physical evidence cues provide excellent opportunities for the firm to send consistent and strong messages regarding the organization’s purpose, the intended market segments, and the nature of the service.

For example- A travel company like Cox and Kings prints brochures to send potential and existing customers messages regarding the nature of service, the variety of service provided and the intended customers who can enjoy these services.

All of these represent evidence or tangible cues that shape a service reality. Organizations that carefully consider the various setting devices can effectively communicate important information about the service to the customers.

3. Process:

The actual procedures, mechanisms, and flow of activities by which the service is delivered. It includes the actual delivery steps that the customer experiences, or the operational flow of the service. These also give customers evidence to judge the service. Some services are very complex, requiring the customer to follow a complicated and extensive series of actions to complete the process.

Another distinguishing characteristic of the process that can provide evidence to the customer is whether the service follows a standardized approach or whether the process is an customized one. For example, two successful airline companies, Indigo and Jet Airways, follow very different process models.

Indigo is a no-frills, low-priced airline that offers relatively short flights. Jet Airways, on the other hand, focuses on the business traveler and is concerned with meeting individual traveler needs. Thus, its process is highly customized to the individual, and employees are empowered to provide nonstandard service when needed. Both airlines have been very successful.

Process tries to set certain standards for providing the service. Organizations
can set a particular process and train their employees to follow this process of delivering service. This will help the customers to perceive the service in a comprehensive manner. Process can develop standards for the organization, which are necessary for the customer to initiate repurchase of a service.

If the customer knows that this company follows a particular procedure, the customer feels he ‘knows’ about the service. This makes the customer aware of the service and it enables him to experience the service in the future. For example- Idea Cellular follows a process for providing customer care service for customers who face certain issues with their cellular phone network. Once the customer is aware of this procedure, he knows that they have set certain standards to make sure customer issues are solved.

Process also enables employees or service providers to deliver better quality of service. A systematic process enables the service provider to understand the customer better and to provide satisfactory solutions to customer’s problems. Service providers can check customer profile in database and can come up customized service options to create and maintain customer relationship.

For example- Shoppers Stop have made excellent use of technology to enhance process mix for the employees and customers. By joining the rewards programme (process) the employees can send special offers and discounts on the customer’s birthday or anniversary.

This helps maintain a good customer- company relationship. Similarly, Starbucks offers a free beverage to the customers who have enrolled in the rewards card programme of Starbucks. Process, thus helps in Customer Relationship Management.

The three new marketing mix elements (people, physical evidence, and process) are included in the marketing mix as separate elements because any or all of them may influence the customer’s level of satisfaction and repurchase decisions.

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Service Marketing – Pricing in Service Marketing

An important element of the marketing-mix and the one that brings in revenue for a company is pricing. The pricing strategy developed by a company can either help the company reap the maximum profits or throw it out of business. Companies must ensure that their pricing structure covers the costs incurred to produce a service, earns profitable margins for the company and at the same time, provides the maximum value to the customers.

Further, companies should not design a pricing structure in isolation; rather it should be consider and design it along with the other elements of the marketing-mix.

The pricing of services is different from the pricing of goods in many ways. Price has a single name in the manufacturing sector, whereas it takes different names in the services sector. For example, the price charged for advertising is known as commission, for boarding and lodging services, as tariff; for legal services and health care as fees; and for share or stock services as brokerage and commission. Pricing of goods is determined by the market demand in most cases, unless regulated by the government.

On the other hand, price is controlled by different bodies for various services. For example, prices for government provided services like the railways are completely controlled by the government; prices for services like banking, power, telephone, and insurance are partially regulated by the government, prices in hotels, domestic services, auto servicing, personal care services, recreation, etc., vary according to the demand in the market; and prices of advertising services, hospitals, expert services like lawyers and stock brokers are determined by the service providers themselves.

Further, the price of a service is perceived by customers in various ways. For example, a service that is high priced is considered to be of premium quality. On the other hand, prices vary in services where limited standardisation is possible. For example, prices for personalised services like hairstyling are not standardised as they vary according to the style opted for by the customer. However, the processes opted for hairstyling may be standardised. As services are perishable in nature, the demand for a particular service at a given point determines the changes in price to a large extent.

Key Characteristics of Pricing in Services:

In general customers’ perceptions of prices are different for goods and services. For example, a customer can easily perceive that a flat screen television or a home theatre is worth a higher price than a normal convex screen television. However, evaluating the price attached to travelling on a particular airline or choosing a holiday destination is not equally simple.

Let us now discuss the differences in customer perceptions of price between goods and services:

1. Price is a Measure of Quality in Services:

A customer turns to pricing to assess the quality of a service when he does not have any information from other sources like a company’s advertising activities or its brand name that would highlight the company’s reputation. Pricing is considered to be the best measure of quality, especially in services whose quality or price differs widely from the other players in a group of service providers. For example, when a beauty parlour offers a facial at Rs.250 against the average market charge of Rs.150 and promises quality, the customer has a better feeling about the quality of service.

Therefore, most of the premium service providers price their services higher than the market price. Further, pricing helps customers estimate the quality of services with high credence properties and thus minimise the perceived risk involved in the purchase.

For example, services like medical treatment, education facilities, or consulting services involve high-risk and high credence properties; therefore, customers tend to rely on pricing in the absence of other information, to judge the quality of these services. Service providers should, therefore, design a pricing strategy that stands as evidence for the quality of services offered by them.

2. Non-Monetary Costs and Pricing:

Researchers have found that certain non-monetary costs are also incurred by the customers in the process of consuming a service or purchasing a product. Therefore, the demand for a service is also affected by these non-monetary costs. Consumers perceive that they have incurred certain other costs in addition to the actual price paid for the service and these costs are known as non-monetary costs. They include time cost, search cost, psychological cost and convenience cost.

i. Time cost involves the time spent by consumers in co-producing the service or in waiting to receive the service. For example, the time spent by a patient in the out-patient wing of a hospital to meet the doctor and receive a prescription, or the time spent by a customer in the restaurant to give an order and then have it served, constitute the time cost involved in the two cases. Customers often have to spend their time to receive a service. Therefore, service providers should try to minimise the time spent by the customers in the process of availing of a service.

ii. Search cost involves the efforts made by a customer to recognise and choose the required service. The search costs of services are high compared to those of goods as the prices of goods are easily known and this facilitates comparison. For example, say a customer wants to hire a taxi from Mumbai to Pune. He enquires about the cost from three-four service providers before selecting the cheapest one.

However, when he stops midway for filling in petrol, he sees the standard price of petrol displayed and gets it filled in the tank. Therefore, customers have to gather information from various service providers before making a decision. The only exception to the point is in the insurance or financial services, where agents or brokers provide all the information required by a customer.

iii. Psychological costs are borne by the customers either at the time of buying the services or at the time of consuming them. A customer’s fear of those terms in an insurance policy which he cannot understand, or his fear of being rejected by a banker when he applies for a loan, are examples of psychological costs. Psychological costs are incurred by some customers even when positive changes are introduced in service consumption. For example, when airlines started offering online reservation, customers were not comfortable about giving out their credit card numbers to reserve the ticket.

iv. Convenience costs involve the inconvenience faced by customers in consuming the service and is different from the time, search and psychological costs. For example, when a resort or a hotel opens a spa beyond the outskirts of the city (say 20 Kms away from the city limits), customers are put to some inconvenience in travelling to the resort and back. They will include this inconvenience cost as a non­monetary cost involved in consuming the service.

3. Difficulty in Comparing Prices of Services:

Every consumer has some reference price in mind when purchasing a product. The reference price can be an amount paid by the customer in the past for the same service or the price paid by a friend or acquaintance for a similar service. The pricing structure in services is quite complicated, as a wide variety of services can be offered due to the flexibility involved. For example, when a customer desires a room in a hotel, he can reserve either an AC or a non- AC room with a double or single bed.

In addition, the prices vary for each combination. In addition, the intangible feature of services makes it more difficult for customers to assess the value of various services and compare them. For example, while Indian Airlines charges Rs.3,750 for the economy class travel between Mumbai and Hyderabad, Jet Airways charges Rs.4,025 for the same service. It becomes difficult for the passengers to compare their prices relative to the service provided by them.

4. Prices Vary with Demand:

The pricing of services also varies with the demand for a particular service and this demand depends on the seasonal variations either directly or indirectly. For example, Goa Tourism Development Corporation Ltd., has different off-season charges for its various tour packages. Similarly, hotels can vary their room Charges for AC rooms during the season and off-season.

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Service Marketing – Communication in Service Marketing

Communication is a dynamic and decisional process and method of transmitting the information from one person to the other. Communication is an important aspect of human behaviour and intentions.

According to Keith Davis “Communication is the process of passing information and understanding from one person to another.”

In service phenomenon, marketing communication means and tools are especially important because they may promote and create most appropriate images and a sense of reliability, credibility, confidence and reassurance.

Within modern business, there has emerged a new trend of value creation, specialisation, rational decision making, skilled business ventures, professionalism, research and development etc. So, it is needful to frame out of communication phenomenon specifically for service marketing.

Specifying Objectives of Communication in Service Marketing:

Communication has a vital role and it contributes heavily to the success or failure of every business activity along with the service performance. The service marketers need to be clear about specific service objectives and select the most appropriate messages and communication tools to achieve them. There are certain specifying causes to be responsible to study the communication in service marketing campaign.

The objectives as well as the causes may briefly be stated here:

(i) To determine and formulate policies, goals, standards, methods and strategies of service marketing through communication,

(ii) To develop proper cooperation and coordination among different persons and service segments,

(iii) To develop and augment preferences by communicating the strength, benefits and attributes of a specific service,

(iv) To create awareness of the new service offering among all the past and existing customers,

(v) To familiarize customers with service qualities and process in advance of its use,

(vi) To compare and analyse and service with competitors offering and counter competitive claims,

(vii) To create, develop and utilise the original facts and information which aims to remove doubts and incomplete facts so that several misunderstanding can be eradicated properly,

(viii) To create and develop the goodwill and credit of the concern, so that there is a need to formulate a fair media of communication,

(ix) To develop learning attitudes and teach the customers how to use a service to their own best advantage,

(x) To make clear about the nature and composition of different services in context of their tangibleness and intangibleness,

(xi) To promote service guarantees and reassurance to service customers in context of ethical responsiveness of marketers,

(xii) To provide most appropriate service promotional campaign with market segments,

(xiii) To recognize and reward valued customers and energize employees.

‘Adding Values’ through Communication in Service Marketing:

Within service marketing, the prospective customers may need different information and advise about what type of service options are available to them, where and when these services are available. Besides, the customers also require specifically the attributes and benefits out of services. The service marketers may utilise the means and methods of communication to persuade target customers that their service product offers the appropriate solution to meet the customers needs and requirements.

Here, the efforts in respect of adding values through communication provide not only to serve some comprehensive up to date information about product offers but also contribute directly or indirectly the benefits and attributes as desired by customers. As such, the communication efforts in context of value additions serves to not only attract new users but also maintain the contact with existing customers and builds relationship with them.

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Service Marketing – Customization: Objectives, Aspects, Problems and Approaches

We the customers consume things of daily use, we also buy and consume the products and get the services according to our needs, demands, preferences, perceptions and capacities. In respect of services, what we get, how we get, when we get, where and why we get depends on our perception, self concept, belief, personality and motivational aspects. The marketers therefore tries to analyze the needs, preferences, perceptions and behaviour of customers which requires to make proper framework of services.

Customization is complementary part of service marketing and often it performed to bring about desired results and to achieve most appropriate ways of customers’ satisfaction. It referred to make or build a wide and appropriate platform according to individual or personal specifications to provide different value added services in context of customers’ portfolio. The service marketers provide the values from access to goods, professional skills, merchandising facilities, systems and procedures on the ground of customization.

Within business scenario, customization denotes the methods and process of delivering wide market goods and services that are modified to satisfy a specific customer needs. Mass customization is marketing and manufacturing technique that combines the applicability of personalization aim to create and develop the customers’ satisfaction.

Objectives of Customization:

The objectives of customization in context of service marketing are briefly stated here:

(i) To analyze and find out the degrees of parameters as well as standardization in context of market offers to meet the needs of different customers,

(ii) To analyze and find out the customers’ perceptions, expectations and delight,

(iii) To search out and analyze the needful modifications and changes in market visions, policies and programmes towards effective customization,

(iv) To analyze and search out marketing and manufacturing techniques that combines the flexibility of customer focus approaches with low unit cost associated with mass production,

(v) To analyze and find out the key service areas and different measures particularly in retail trade to acquired competitive advantages,

(vi) To analyze and find out the measures to increase the high level of customers’ loyalty,

(vii) To analyze and find out the customers’ views and opinions on the basis of their needs and requirements, to make and influence on business and marketing decisions,

(viii) To give more emphasis to improve to raise the value for money and empowerment of customers,

(ix) To make some needful changes and modifications in the quality and brands in products and services as per individual specifications and requirements.

Major Considerable Aspects within Customization:

Within the phenomenon of service marketing, the customization is an unavoidable and decisional aspect. It aims to develop the customers orientation platform to focus the importance and recognition of the dignity of customers.

There are some major considerable and signifying aspects within customization that are briefly stated here:

(i) The aspects as studied here provide appropriate measures and techniques to study the behavioural aspects and attitudes of customers,

(ii) They provide and establish proper, amicable and rational platform for decision making towards service performance,

(iii) They provide most applicable ways and means to make congenial relationship patterns with customers,

(iv) They provide a dynamic platform to create and develop the customers’ loyalty and belongingness with services,

(v) These aspects inspired to make or build or construct or modify the product or services according to the requirements of customers,

(vi) The aspects to consider and modify manufacturing process and techniques to be needful in market.

Problems in Customization:

There are several problems in the approaches of customization.

Some of them are stated here:

(i) It is very difficult to measure the customers’ attitudes and behaviour,

(ii) It is a difficult task to measure the level of customers’ acquisition and retention in context of service marketing,

(iii) It is difficult to manage the positioning of services with different compositions,

(iv) It is difficult to determine the market segments and target market,

(v) It is difficult to manage value additions of different services.

(vi) It is difficult to analyse and evaluate the level of customization.

Major Approaches for Effective Customization:

The major approaches to make effective customization are briefly stated here:

1. Analyze and Finding Out Losing Customers:

In any market scenario, it is needful to make strong and long lasting relationship patterns. In service performance the dissatisfaction occurs when and what is provided is less than the promise or customers’ expectations. There are several causes or indicators as given here responsible by which the marketers lose their customers. Here, it is most needful to analyze and find out the causes of losing customers or their dissatisfaction or not have a buying capacity to get the services or not got the services as per their expectations.

Here, it is necessary to find out the causes or indicators for losing the customers which are as given here:

(i) If customers are dissatisfied with the services – pre sale, during sales and after sales – they would switch over to a substitute.

(ii) Customers can also move away towards the competitors’ products attracted by augmented benefits offered by them.

(iii) Customers could also defect from a brand due to personal reasons – shift of residence, change in preferences, influence of family and friends, disgust, anger and sentimental reasons.

(iv) If the price of a service appears very high and the customers perceives a mismatch between the price and customers’ expected value, they would switch to another offer.

(v) If a new service design which is advanced with better benefits and attributes enters in market, then customers may opt for that.

(vi) If any reference person or group may be contributed towards another services.

(vii) If there is some poor service performance with some unsatisfied standards and parameters.

(viii) If there is indifferent attitudes, non-cooperation and irresponsiveness of service employees, then customers may opt for another.

2. Concept of Perception:

Perception is a process of sensory organs. Within our environmental scenario, the mind gets the information through the five sense organs i.e. eyes, nose, ears, tongue and skin. The perception starts with the awareness of the stimulus.

The stimulation comes to the organs through actions, information, messages, context, needs, attitudes, values, interest, taste and touch etc. Within the process of customization, we should behave with the customers on the basis of their perception of the reality. It is essential to understand the bases of perception that influence the customers’ needs, urge, requirements and interest in context of service performance.

3. Services Positioning:

It is the foremost part of customization that in service marketing, there is a need to introduce and identity the standards and parameters of the nature and composition of services for customers. It is most essential to make a platform for service positioning in an appropriate manner.

The pre requisites for service positioning are briefly given here:

(i) Proper design the target market, whereas the present and potential customers are available,

(ii) It is most needed to establish the reliability, responsiveness and most comfortable performance of services,

(iii) It is needed to analyze the customers’ preferences, attitudes, behaviours and their portfolios towards services,

(iv) The beneficial and value oriented aspects may be considered within service performance,

(v) The brand loyalty and sensitivity are also having some pre requisites of some services.

(vi) The pre design and composition of services are needful to accommodate the customers.

4. Analyze Market Potentialities:

It is the foremost part of customization to analyze the market potentialities in respect of present and future demand of services, market share, customers view points, appropriate target market, customer acquisition level, buying trends, required service standards and parameters and service market segments etc. These analysis are based on market strategies and customers’ behavioural approaches.

5. Customers’ Loyalty:

Customers loyalty is basic approach to make most applicability of mass customization. It is the foremost and decisional part of customization. It is an outcome of customers’ trust, faith or confidence in the marketers’ offer. The service attributes, standards and value maximization are the foremost strategies leading to customers loyalty.

6. Role of Personnel:

In order to perform most applicable part of service performance, the role of sales personnel, salesmen, marketers, workers and self employees’ persons are very important. They belong with a team spirit and they must identify the needs, hopes, expectations and values of customers to becoming more proactive. In this context, the service marketers should be dedicated with their valuable knowledge, skills and competencies.

We should develop the team spirit, builds cooperation, make discipline, to follow and implement suitable policies, stimulate career approaches, learning attitudes and create and develop morale and ethical values in service performance. They may improve their thinking by using logic and by adopting proven techniques that will lead to better ideologies and intuition.

7. Location of Sites:

Location for service performance is also an important part to customize the services. It depends on the types and degrees of interaction involved. The multi-site operating services like car rental, tours, travels and tourism becomes a critical decision. The most desirable of various site alternatives should be considered at this movement.

Some of the factors are influencing the locational aspects for services as market requirement, competitive advantages, convenient sites, complementary services, availability of raw material, infrastructure, market opportunities, financial services, technology based social status and government regulations.

8. Pricing the Services:

Pricing the services are also an important and decisional aspect. The alternative pricing methods or approaches for service are similar to those used for goods.

The role of pricing of services are given here:

(i) More or less the positioning of services depends on pricing,

(ii) The cost structure, shared resources and corporate objectives duly effects the price decision,

(iii) Pricing of services may ensure maximization of profitability over a given period,

(iv) Pricing of services builds market share and sales volume,

(v) Pricing objectives may be based on achieving a desired return on investment,

(vi) A service company may wish to follow pricing to position itself as exclusive.

9. Production Standard:

The manufacturers are also required to follow different market driven practices at their level. They may determine their production process, schedule, systems and techniques as per customers expectation and requirements. More and appropriate emphasize should be given on customers motives, behavior and their life style on the part of production.

10. Managing Customers’ Values:

Value denotes the consolidated form of different attributes and benefits that customers’ expects from a given product and services. It also expressed some utilities of products and services and occurs a state of satisfaction. We should measure the real value deliver to our customers focusing on their right priorities with their ultimate goal of selecting the services. We have to realize that only excellent values creates the retention, preferences and loyalty of customers in context of service performance.

11. Customers’ Retention:

The marketers are needed to keep the customers and to hold them at their favorable atmosphere. They must be prepared to get our services by their own and free decisions. Marketers may try to keep the optimum and fair interactions with customers on the basis of their needs, motives and behaviour. We should provide most applicable and desirable behaviour with customers to buy the products and get the service performance. Anyhow, we should provide merchandising facilities with some value addition in satisfying the service targets aims to achieve customers’ retention.

12. Marketing Research:

Marketing research is an objectives and systemization body of knowledge. It provides different data and information about strategical and tactical view points. In respect of customer life scenario, this informative task is beneficial in customization.

13. Customers Motives and Preferences:

It is the foremost part of marketers that they should manage and organize to analyse different customers perceptions, motives and behaviour. Here, the basis of customization may be the societal market and its different segments. The customers motives and preferences becomes the decisional part of customization.

14. Service Delivery:

It is fact that customization follow a market driven orientation and aims at increasing customers’ satisfaction. Service delivery shows the applicability of nature and behavioural aspects of services.

At this moment, the part of service delivery may be considered the points as given here:

(i) Service delivery should be based on suitability of the customers environment,

(ii) Consideration should be made to analyze the behavioural aspects,

(iii) Develops the trust, confidence and reliabilities within the process of delivery of services,

(iv) Service performance should be efficient, effective and amicable for the interest of customers,

(v) Role and impact of society and reference person is needful in context of service delivery.

(vi) To firing the employees under un-justice, unfair and fraud conditions,

(vii) Targeting the avenues of total customers’ satisfaction.

15. Knowledge Management:

The concept of knowledge management is invariably related with the ideology of learning organizations. The service marketers and customers should always develop their attitudes and learn the behavioural patterns of each other. The service marketers should follow the basic approaches of knowledge management aims to make more effective part of customization.

It includes:

(i) To collect, analyze and disseminate information related to customers,

(ii) To create and develop a relevant yardstick of service performance,

(iii) To identify the area needing changes and improvement in service parameters and performance,

(iv) To analyze the strong customer bondage with new strategic patterns.

16. After Sales Services:

It is an important and most decisional part within the transaction process of buying and selling of the product. The service marketing has also made a juncture to follow the concept and practices of after sale services.

After the service performance, it is the foremost responsibility of service providers to contribute different services like consultation, technological, maintenance, feasibleness, commitments, diversifications, repositioning, data mining task and service quality upgradation. The amicable and worthwhile role of service providers may create the desires, beliefs, confidence, aspirations and responsiveness among the customers towards accelerating the ways of proper customization.

17. Complaint and Grievance Redressal:

Complaint and grievance of customers should be considered in proper way. In the performance of services there may arise several complaints and grievances out of the customers. They must be removed with some justified and more responsive manners. Solution of complaint and grievances may become the part of successful service performance. It has a set of procedures to identifying and creating the service values on the part of customers.

As such, the customization is an important and decisional part of service marketing. It is based on personnel skills, abilities, professional values and personalities. There are different objectives as discussed in it. Within this attempt major considerable aspects within customization as well as the contents of it are discussed here. A brief process to establish customization is also enumerated. There are different worthwhile approaches for making most excellences in customizations in respect of service marketing also enumerated. Before it the problems of customization are also analyzed here.

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Service Marketing – Marketing Challenges of Managing Service Businesses

Managing, growing, and profiting with both product and service businesses are challenging tasks. But the challenges are different from one to the other. Listed below are some of the most common and difficult challenges of growing and managing consulting, professional, or technology service businesses that don’t necessary apply to product businesses.

1. Clients can’t see or touch services before they purchase them – This makes services difficult to conceptualise and evaluate from the client perspective, creating increased uncertainty and perception of risk. From the firm’s perspective, service intangibility can make services difficult to promote, control quality, and set price.

2. Services are often produced and consumed simultaneously – This creates special challenges in service quality management that product companies do not even consider. Products are tested before they go out of the door. If a product has quality problems while in production, the company can fix them and customers are none the wiser. Service production happens with the customer present, creating a very different and challenging dynamic.

3. Trust is necessary – Some level of trust in the service organisation and its people must be established before clients will engage services. This is as important, sometimes more important, than the service offerings and their value proposition.

4. Competition is often not who you think – Competition for product companies are other product companies. Competition for service companies are often the clients themselves. Sure, sometimes you find yourself in a competitive shootout (some firms more than others), but often the client is asking ‘should we engage this service at all’ and ‘if so, should we just do it in- house’.

5. Brand extends beyond marketing – Brand in service businesses is about who you are as much as what you say about yourself. And internal brand management and communications can be equally as vital to marketing success as are external communications.

6. Proactive lead generation is difficult – Many service companies have tried, and failed, at using lead generation tactics that work wonders for product companies. Implemented correctly, traditional product techniques, such as direct marketing and selling, can work for services, but the special dynamics of how clients buy services must be carefully woven into your strategy.

7. Service deliverers often do the selling – Many product companies have dedicated sales forces. For services, the selling is often split between sales, marketing, professional, and management staff.

8. Marketing and sales lose momentum – Most product companies have dedicated marketers and sellers. They market and sell continuously, regardless of the revenue levels they generate. In many services companies the marketers and sellers also must manage and deliver. This can often lead to the Services Revenue Rollercoaster-wide swings between revenue and work overflow, and revenue and work drought.

9. Passion is necessary, yet elusive – The more passion, spirit, hustle, and desire your staff brings to the organisation everyday, the more revenue and success you will have. The correlation between staff passion and financial success is direct and measurable (as is the correlation between lack-of-passion and organisational failure). Yet institutionalising passion, while necessary, is agonisingly elusive.

Because of the basic difference between goods and services, marketers of service face some very real and distinctive challenges. The challenges resolve around understanding the customer needs and expectations of service, tangibilising the service offering, dealing with a myriad of people and delivery issues and keeping promises made to customers.

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Service Marketing – Globalisation of Service Market (With Reasons)

With the economies initiating the globalization process and technological revolution with liberalized business and trading policies of countries has led to internationalization of services.

Globalization is defined as the reduction of transaction cost of trans-border movements of capital and goods thus of factors of production and goods.

The services market has become a major source of employment and contributes the largest portion the revenue to the GDP.

The service industry includes sectors such as education, counselling, health, and environment. Information technology enabled services and business process outsourcing and many others.

Major reasons for the growth of services in Indian economy are liberalization and also changes in external environment with Political, Economical, Sociocultural and technological changes.

Some of the reasons for globalization are given below:

1. Changes in political thinking

2. Global social awakening

3. Technological Innovations

4. Competition in the international market

1. Changes in Political Thinking:

Political leaders and thinkers have now realized the benefits of running an open economy that can trade across nations without any constraints on account of bias against the nationalities of business houses. With China being a leader in opening their economy to international participation in its growth.

WTO (World trade Organisation) made efforts and created a global economy by persuading member countries to do away with many restrictions and hence yielding results. Other nations are lowering their barriers to services and goods, Hence these countries are providing improved infrastructure to invite all global organisations to participate in the economic development. Thus converting the world in to small international trading centre in services and products.

2. Global Social Awakening:

People from all over world have been brought to one platform through global social awakening. Social sites like facebook, orkut, Google, Yahoo and many such interactive blogs and websites allow people of different nationalities to come together and share their experiences. Hence this social awakening has led to the growth of non-governmental services and social services to globalize their efforts.

Society is converging into one global human society sharing similar tastes and lifestyles and hence generating global demand for similar services all over the globe and all the service providers hence easily follow global business model in different countries.

3. Technological Innovations:

Rapid technological innovations has led to the distribution of services like healthcare, training, education, counseling to be administered across long distances. Customer and service providers can be very far away, yet very much in contact through technological connect available by means of internet, webcams, web conferencing etc. The customer if techsavvy can have a virtual tour of the service he wants to buy and can take a decision thereafter, all thanks to technological developments.

4. Competition in the International Market:

With Global companies now foraying into Indian market, competition has increased for the home based service organisations. Transnational and multinational corporations are now setting up service facilities in many countries and thus giving rise to stiff competition.

To beat the competition, companies are now surpassing the quality offered by their competitor. Companies also offer competitive cost advantage, by looking at the places where they can achieve cost benefit. This at times leads to setting up the base in the third countries.

Companies also need to plan for availability of skilled and trained manpower.

Many companies like DELL, ADOBE, ORACLE, GE, IBM, and Microsoft have realized the cost effectiveness and availability of skilled and trained manpower in India and hence consider India for operations.

Major decisions in international marketing includes following:

(i) Observing global marketing environment

(ii) To Decide whether to go international

(iii) Markets identification to enter

(iv) To decide how to enter the market

(v) Plan global marketing program

(vi) Decide global marketing organisation. 

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Service Marketing – Problems Faced by a Marketer of Services

Typical problems to be faced by a marketer of services are given below:

1. Sale, production and consumption of a service takes place almost simultaneously.

2. A service cannot be cent-ally produced, inspected, stockpiled and warehoused. It is delivered wherever the customer is, by people who are beyond the immediate influence of management.

3. A service cannot be demonstrated, nor can a sample be sent for customer’s approval or trial in advance of purchase. The provider of a service can explain, promise and tell how the service has benefited others but, for the prospective customer, the service does not exist.

4. The importance of word-of-mouth (views) expressed by customers, his impressions about us, his or her belief in what people speak about us is an important factor in deciding whether or not he or she will avail of our services and do business with us.

5. A service is frequently an experience that cannot be shared, passed around or given away to someone else once it is delivered. Hence, every time there is an interaction, the customer goes back, not merely satisfied but also delighted.

6. The customer’s perception of service quality is more directly linked to the morale, motivation, knowledge, skills and authority of the frontline staff of any service organisation.

7. The receiver’s expectations are critical to his or her satisfaction with the service. What he or she gets, compared and contrasted to what he or she expects to get, determines customer satisfaction.

8. A service organisation such as a bank or a hotel cannot achieve customer satisfaction without first gaining employee satisfaction. Only happy employees can assure happy customers. Management must ensure high employee morale to achieve satisfied and happy customers of a service concern.

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Service Marketing – Top 9 Benefits Due to the Growing Service Industry

Services are a growing sector in almost all the countries of the world. This sector is majorly responsible for the overall growth and development of the country’s economy. Any other fields like trade, tourism, hospitality and many more, even services have been a justified reason of pride for maximum countries including India. It not only increases the GDP of a nation but it also offers many advantages on a long-term basis.

Following are a couple of booming benefits due to the growing service industry:

1. Generation of Employment Opportunities:

Service industry has definitely given a lot of employment opportunities in the country. Service is needed in almost every sector like tourism, communications, trade, marketing, manufacturing, international technology and more. Many organisations are considering quality service to be their mission and vision and they are really working hard to render quality services to their customers and thus retain them.

Companies are open to employing adequate employees in this sector which will in turn be earning benefits for the company itself. Thus, with the growth and development of service sectors, the employment opportunities have seen a remarkable growth. Most of the people have been employed in the service sectors of the country and have successfully added to the overall development of the economy as a whole.

2. Increasing the Standard of Living:

Due to the increase in service sectors, there has been an increase in the employment opportunities as well. Moreover, due to the increase in the employment opportunities amongst people, there has been increase in the earnings and incomes of every household. This in turn has automatically upgraded the standard of living of people as they can earn good incomes and spend the same to satisfy their growing needs and wants.

Standard of living also increases because the country is in a decent position to offer quality goods and services to its citizens. Thus, usage of quality products and an ability to spend for fulfilling one’s desires is a big sign that highlights the increased standard of living in a particular country.

3. Optimum Utilisation of Resources:

India is bestowed with an ample variety of rich resources. Due to the increase in technology, the human resources have seen a slow fall in technology dominated fields like IT and manufacturing. On the other hand, it is the service sector that has given innumerable employment opportunities to all types of people.

Various services firms like tourism, entertainment, export, personal care services, hospitality and more have been booming rapidly. In fact, these areas do not utilise any of the country’s natural resources and are based only on the human resources. Thus, service sector also helps in conserving the natural resources of the country for future generations.

4. Capital Formation:

Service sectors have been a major player in providing ample employment opportunities, increase in income and increase in the standard of living of people. With this, it has also expanded the capital formation of the country. Various areas of the economy are highly dependent on the service sectors.

They have envisioned immense growth and development just because of the growing service sectors in the country. Moreover, it is estimated that these specialised sectors will see further growth and expansion which will actually help the country in capital formation. This whole process of capital formation is also known as a nation-building process.

Economic, political and social factors majorly signal further expansion of the service sectors. Performance of profitable services can absorb higher investments from various sources which in turn will automatically accelerate the rate of capital formation in the country.

5. Use of Environment-Friendly Technology:

Service industry is one of the fields which do not pollute or harm the environment in any way. Thus it is known as an environment friendly technology. Service sectors work closely only with the human resources and thus are harmless to the surroundings, unlike the manufacturing process which releases harmful gases, chemicals and wastes that harm the environment in various ways. Service sector has been indeed laudable in this regard.

6. Economic Liberalisation:

The process of economic liberalisation started in India in the year 1991. Since then there have has been visible changes in the overall business scenario of the country. Even the multinational players were allowed to enter the Indian markets thus giving further growth and development to the country’s economy and trade. It also created ample policies and opportunities to the Indians to establish their own businesses and expand further.

7. Migration:

There has been a remarkable increase in the migration rate of the people from the rural and semi-urban areas to the urban areas. Desire for better jobs and better livelihood resulted in immense rate of migration. This in turn led to further expansion of businesses, trades, transport and other service sectors. Actually both the factors worked hand-in-hand to witness increasing demand in placement and personal services of the country.

8. Export Potential:

India is considered one of the major exporters in the world. There are various services that India offers to different countries like insurance, banking, transport, tourism, data services, communications, construction labour, accounting services, maintenance services, design engineering, education, entertainment, software services, healthcare and commercial services. Thus, the service sector has expanded the export potential of India.

9. Growth in Population of DINKS:

Due to increasing opportunities in the employment sector, both the spouses prefer to work and earn a decent livelihood. They prefer to choose their dream profession and dedicate themselves completely due to which they cannot or prefer not to have children. This situation has actually given a lot of growth in the DINKS population which is an acronym for Dual Income No Kids.

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Service Marketing – Growth and Development of Service Marketing:

In present business scenario, the business offers is concerned with the specific elements like the complementary services as designed by several factors. There are several causes to be responsible for growth and development of service sector.

Some of them are stated here:

1. Innovational and Intelligence – Within business and industrial sectors, some of the persons create and innovate new ideas, views, assumptions, methods and systems in their working environment. It is the part of innovatives and intelligencies to make some ideas for service designs and performance.

2. Entrepreneurial Skills – There are certain qualities and skills that promote the entrepreneurial tacts and skills. The skills may be as physical, mental, business and technological etc. These skills have been initiated to make an appropriate service process design and performance in organization.

3. Technological Skills and Development – The businessman utilize and adopt new and specific knowledge, technical know-how, mechanization and technical process for the interest of their enterprise. It may create new skills and ventures to promote service performance. Besides, the technological development as well as greater complexity of products also raise the growth of services.

4. Personal Traits – The successfulness and prosperity depends on attitudes, behaviour, loyalty, truthfulness, confidence and maturity of any person. All of them create the variety of qualities to promote entrepreneurial activities and personal traits within service sector.

5. Personal Freedom – Some of the persons are required to establish their identifications and recognition by separating their families and society. They want to develop their dignified and independent entity to achieve some new things. It has raised to motivate new services ventures.

6. Goal Oriented – Every businessman or entrepreneur are motivated to earn more profit and to achieve a high level of target. All their activities, behaviour and attitudes are oriented to achieve visions and goals. The firm determination and their devotional attitudes may be motivated to inspire the target of business and services.

7. Occupational Qualities – In business scenario there are certain knowledge, skills and qualities required to fulfill their major qualities in respect of different occupations. The emerging trends of new occupations have made increase new skills and qualities out of the service sectors.

8. Changing Life Styles – In our society, the quality of life has changed and improved. There are different patterns and composition of consumption level has been changed. The rising trends of smaller families have more disposable income to spend on fast food, hotel culture and hospitality services. Presently, in order to make more market expansion, the recreation and entertainment are also needful through service marketing.

9. Social Changes – There are several causes for emerging the service sector like changing social customs, values, behaviour, domestic life scenario, fashions, demands and family structure. Besides, the increased number of women in the workforce has also led to the service sector with multifarious aspects.

10. Increasing Affluence – Presently the modern society having a sufficient source of income and most of the families have enough money to afford some luxurious services. There is a greater demand of household furniture, jewellery, gold coins, interior decoration, laundry and care of garden and luxurious care etc. These services emphasise the demand of different services.

11. Increasing Complexity of Life – There are great practices and adverse tendencies of family and social conflict. The demand of civil courts, legal advisers, family counselors, marriage counseling, labour laws, tax consultation and medical practices have been an emerging trend to stimulate the service sector.

12. Human Values – In business, the human values and attitudes plays major role to initiate the service sector. The emerging trends of human and sociological environment initiate the desirable comfortable and motivational service practices by means of service sectors.

13. Management Consultancy Service – Within a wide area of management, the consultancy services has increased and new avenues of services emerged. The consultancy services like investment planning, HRD programmes, technological upgradation, sales promotion and market strategies have become the part of service sectors.

14. More Emphasize on Customers’ Orientation – For the last two decades the market scenario and its several aspects have been oriented by customers’ profile and their decisional role. Every aspects of market opportunities are required to achieve customers’ acquisition and retention. These emerging trends of market have an important and appropriate cause for the development of service sector.

15. Impact of Customization – A well-known scenario have emerged that all the business concern should determine and manage all those methods and systems which may establish the customization scenario. Here, on the basis of targeted strategies for customers’ orientation, the business initiate the role and emerging trends of customization. More emphasis have been given on customers expectation and the concept of customer care and satisfaction becomes the inevitable part to develop the service sector.

16. Contributions of Banks and Financial Institutions – In our economy, the expansion and multifarious services of Banks and different financial institutions have been responsible to the growth and development of service sectors. They provide several benefits and services to service providers to promote their business in different areas.

17. Environmental Factors – There are several environmental factors responsible to develop the service sectors. The factors are multifarious marketing issues, new life style of customers, wide range of business expansions, development of retail trades, more emphasis on customers’ performances, customers’ oriented aspects, new technology and societal marketing etc.

18. Specialization – Within overall business scenario, in each and every field, increased specialization has led to greater reliance on specialist service providers. The core values of specialization becomes the decisional platform at different developmental stages in modern service sectors.

19. Professional Attitudes – The concept of profession is required to create and implement the learning attitudes, code of ethics, responsiveness and develop the service motives. All these aspects have led to increasing trends of service sector and its marketing phenomenon.

20. Consciousness towards Social Responsibilities – For any business the concept and targets of social responsibilities are foremost and signifying aspects in context of their social values. By the means of services, the business may easily follow this social responsibility.

21. Social Marketing – The emerging trends of social marketing are an important basement to develop the business as well as service sector also. The concept and profile of social marketing has led to emphasise on the framework of service performance. The upgradation of service marketing are based on social structure, systems and behaviour.

22. Products’ Differentiates – In market trends phenomenon, there are different product lines having varied of nature, quality and composition etc. For proper implementation of product missions, line and strategies, there is a need to make some suitable services.

23. Advances in Information Technology – There are several emerging trends to stimulate the information systems and technology. Some of them are convergence of computers and telecommunications, creates more compact mobile equipments, wireless networking, more powerful softwares, appearance of audio video systems and growth of internet etc. have been stimulating the new ventures in service sector.

24. New Business Trends – Within purview of business, some of the emerging concepts and motivational aspects are much important to stimulate the new avenues of service sector. These aspects are more likely to emphasise on value added aspects, service motives, quality movement, professional attitudes, to emphasise on productivity and cost savings and growth of retail marketing etc.

25. Government Policies – The changing and new developmental policies and regulations also stimulate the growth of service sector. The concept of welfare state, more emphasis on public services, privatization, consumer’s protection and environmental issues have been the stimulation of service sector.

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