MRKT 55030: SERVICES MRKT 55030: SERVICES MARKETINGMARKETING

WEEK 3:WEEK 3: Service Quality and the Gaps Model:Service Quality and the Gaps Model:Assessing an Organization’s Assessing an Organization’s

Service Delivery StrategyService Delivery Strategy

Dr. Okey Peter ONYIADr. Okey Peter ONYIA

TODAY’S OUTLINE: TODAY’S OUTLINE: Service Quality defined

Perspectives of Service Quality

Dimensions of Service Quality

The Gaps Model of Service Quality

Closing the Service Quality Gaps

Assessing Service Delivery Strategy

Service Quality Gaps Audit

Group Discussions & Exercise

Measures of Service Quality

First in-class Quiz

Next lecture pre-work.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs):At the end of this session, you should be able to:

Demonstration a good understanding of Service Quality (SQ).

Discuss the perspectives and dimensions of Service Quality.

Evaluate service quality gaps and how companies endeavour to close their service gaps.

Appraise how companies assess their service delivery strategies.

Analyze the measures of service quality and how companies evaluate their service quality components in line with specified standards and customer perceptions/expectations.

Service Quality

… is the perceived outcome of a service experience as defined by the customer after a service

encounter

What is Service Quality?

Dimensions of Service Quality

Different Perspectives of Service Quality

Source: Lovelock and Wirtz (2011)

The Gaps Model of Service Quality

The Gaps Model of Service Quality

Sources: Adapted from Zeithaml et al. (2013) and Lovelock & Wirtz, 2011)

A. The Service-provider Gaps:

Gap 1 – The Listening Gap:Difference between customer-expectations and

management’s perceptions of customers’ expectations.

Gap 2 – The Service Design and Standards Gap:

The difference between management’s perceptions of customer-expectations and the company’s translations of those perceptions into the right service designs, standards, and quality specifications.

The Gaps Model of Service Quality contd.

The Gaps Model of Service Quality

Sources: Adapted from Zeithaml et al. (2013) and Lovelock & Wirtz, 2011)

The Gaps Model of Service Quality contd.

Sources: Adapted from Zeithaml et al. (2013) and Lovelock & Wirtz, 2011)

Closing the Service Quality Gaps:

Assessing Service Delivery Strategy

Closing the Gaps: Service companies can close their gaps by

conducting a service quality gaps audit – an analysis of their service promises, performance-specifications, standards, and actual service quality – in two ways:

Assessment of Overall Service Strategy

Assessment of Specific Service Implementation

1. Overall Service Strategy Assessment:

How are we doing overall in meeting or exceeding customer expectations?

How are we doing overall in closing each of our four service-provider gaps?

Which gaps represent our strengths and where are our weaknesses?

Closing the Service Quality Gaps:

Service Quality Gaps Audit

Closing the Service Quality Gaps:

Service Quality Gaps Audit

2. Specific Service Implementation Assessment:

Who is our customer? What is our service?

Are we consistently meeting/exceeding our customers’ expectations with this service?

If not, where are the gaps and what changes do we need to make?

Have we closed gaps 1-4 for each particular service?

Article Reading & Group Discussions/Exercise:

In your small groups, read and discuss the article on pages 42/43 of the textbook, titled “Technology

Spotlight: Technology’s Critical Impact on the Gaps Model of Service Quality.”

Each group is to come up with two questions for two other groups in the class.

(20 minutes)

Also, read and discuss the Service Quality Gaps Audit template on pages 46/47 of the textbook. Select a

real service company of your choice, and assess their service quality by grading their gap-closing

performances with the template (points 1 – 10).(25 minutes)

Measures of Service Quality

Service quality measures can be bunched up in two broad categories:

Soft SQ measures

Hard SQ measures

Soft Measures Performance/quality factors not easily observed, but

must be collected by talking to customers, employees and others (opinions, feelings, evaluative thoughts, etc.)

They provide direction, guidance, and feedback to employees on ways to achieve customer satisfaction

They can be quantified by measuring customer perceptions and beliefs of numerous customers.

Examples: SERVQUAL scale, qualitative surveys, and customer advisory panel discussions.

Measures of Service Quality

Hard Measures

Those performance/quality factors that can be counted, timed, or measured through numerical audits.

They are typically operational processes with procedure and desired outcome specifications.

They are standards often set with expected frequency/percentage of occasions on which a particular measure is achieved.

Measures of Service Quality

In-class Quiz 1

Answer all 20 multiple-choice questions on the Scantron

cards supplied

(30 minutes)

Next class pre-work:

Topic: Customer Expectations and Perceptions of Service Offerings.

Read up all of: … chapters 3 and 4 of the textbook.