Service Marketing

Customer-
Defined
Service
Standards

Service Marketing

Standardization implies a nonvarying
sequential process in which each step is laid out
in order and all outcomes are uniform
Customization refers to some level of
adaptation or tailoring of the process to the
individual customer
Service Marketing

It should be customer-defined standards not company-
defined standards.
Customer-Defined Standards Types:
1. Hard Customer-Defined Standards
- Things that can be counted, timed or observed
through audits
2. Soft Customer-Defined Standards
- opinion-based and cannot be directly observed.
They must be collected by talking to customers,
employees or others.
Service Marketing

3. One-Time Fixes
- when customer research is undertaken to find
out what aspects of service need to be changed,
requirements can sometimes be met using one-
time fixes.
- technology, policy or procedure changes that,
when instituted, address customer requirements
Service Marketing

2013 Performance Report Card
Key Measurement Benchmark 2013
Performance
Achieved
1. Percent of customers
satisfied with our
performance
90 percent 84 percent
2. Number of complaints per
1000 customers
Less than 0.5 0.28
3. Percent of customers
disconnected for
nonpayment
No more than 3.0
percent
2.4 percent
4. Percent of in-home
service appointments kept,
as promised
At least 92 percent 98 percent
Service Marketing

Company Customer Priorities Customer-Defined Standards
Southwest Airlines Reliability On-time arrival
Responsiveness to
complaints
Two-week reply to letters
Lenscrafters Quick turnaround on
eyeglasses
Glasses ready in one hour
Texas Instrument Defense
System
Compliance with
commitments
On-time delivery
Product compliance to
requirements
Hard Customer-Defined standard
Service Marketing

Company Customer Priorities Customer-Defined Standards
General Electric Interpersonal skills of
operators:
Tone of voice
Problem-solving
Summarizing actions
Closing
Taking ownership of the
call; following through with
promises made; being
courteous and
knowledgeable;
understanding the
customers question and
request
Ritz-Carlton Being treated with
respect
React quickly to solve any
problems immediately
Use proper telephone
etiquette
Do not screen calls
Eliminate call transfers
when possible
Soft Customer-Defined standard
Service Marketing

Company Customer Priorities Customer-Defined Standards
American Express Resolution of
problems
Resolve problem at first
contact (no transfers, other
calls, or multiple contacts);
communicate and give
adequate instructions; take
all the time necessary
Treatment Listen; do everything
possible to help; be
appropriately reassuring
Courtesy of
representative
Put card member at ease; be
patient in explaining billing
process; display sincere
interest in helping card
member
Soft Customer-Defined standard
Service Marketing

Soft Customer-Defined standard

As Albert Einstein put it,
Not everything that
counts can be counted,
and not everything that
can be counted, counts.
Service Marketing

Measuring Behaviors and Actions
Hard Measurements
- consist of counts or audits or timed actions that
provide feedback about the operational
performance of a service standard
Soft Measurements
- measurements that can document customers
opinions whether performance met the
standards established
2 Perceptual Measurements:
Relationship and SERVQUAL surveys

Service Marketing

Developing Customer-Defined Standards
1. Identifying existing or desired service
encounter sequence
2. Translate customer expectations into
behavior/actions
3. Select behavior/actions for standards
4. Set hard or soft standards
5. Develop feedback mechanisms
Service Marketing

Developing Customer-Defined Standards
6. Establish measures and target levels
7. Track measures against standards

8. Provide feedback about performance to
employees
9. Update target levels and measures