Week 11-Services

• Services are dominated by the intangible elements of the product
• Definition of a service

  The result of the application of human or mechanical efforts to people or objects
• Service


  An act, performance or experience that one party can offer to another, is mainly intangible and can't be owned
• Service characteristics

  • Intangibility
  • Inseparability
  • Variability
  • Perishability
• Intangibility


  • Major characteristic that differentiates service from product
  • Creates uncertainty and anxiety, so to reduce this use tangible cues i.e. logo, guarantees and word of mouth
• Inseparability of production and consumption

  • Services cannot be separated from the provider and customers must be present at consumption of service i.e. a haircut
  • Shared responsibility between them
• Perishability


  • Services cannot be used for later use or sale
  • Major challenge of balancing supply and demand
• Variability


  • Variation in quality and can be overcome by managing customer expectations and investing in staff training and Rewards
  • quality is: hard to control
• Expanded marketing mix for services

  • People
  • Physical evidence
  • Processes
• People


  • Everyone involved with the process experience
  • C2C Interaction: Customers share the same experience which can have positive and negative impacts
• Physical evidence


  • Tangible and intangible cues the customer observes and is important for validation of the quality of services experiences i.e. buildings
• Processes


  • The flow and progress of customers when they engage with the product/company
  • Should exceed expectations i.e. queuing in lines so control wait times
  • Consider if we can make the process faster, cheaper or more efficient by mapping out the process
• • Services is helpful to reduce heterogeneity and perishibility issues and high demand
  • Ensures we design processes that customers get through the service as quickly as possible and we can then move away from inseparability by using technology
• All products contain both tangible and intangible elements and should be marketed with this in mind.