Service Marketing: A Case Study

1.0 Introduction

Twenty first century has turned quite a lot towards service oriented businesses rather than product oriented businesses. They are concerned on earning profits while serving customers at their best for a better level of customer satisfaction.

Service marketing can simply be described as marketing based on relationships between two or more people. But the scope of service marketing cannot be discussed in that simple way as it has to be outlined in different point of views. Jha (2000) defines service marketing as a system that organisations follow to plan, price, promote and distribute services to their customers while achieving company objectives. He says that it is highly expected that a company provides their customers a

As discussed earlier most companies are now leaning on giving the best services to their customers. In order to do that, market place creates a numerous opportunities for employment. Demand for the individuals who expertise in service marketing is very high. At the same time employment and unemployment is one of the major factors that affect the economy of a country. Thus, it is believed that the service marketing is an important aspect in present business world. (Sourov, 2017)

Services are built on relationships. It is vital to maintain a good relationship with customers in order to win their hearts. But a product in the other hand cannot create or maintain any relationship with customers. Morgan (2015) highlights five tips for a meaningful customer relationship and furthermore she exclaims business relationships open the door to the long term business opportunities. Unlike in products, value can be changed according to the level of service an organisation provides, which brings profits at the

It is indeed different than selling a product to a customer and marketers face numerous challenges when selling services. Out of the number of characteristics, Author wishes to discuss the most distinguishing characteristics of services.

Services are intangible. Unlike a product, customers cannot touch and feel the services. They have to decide whether to buy the service or not only with the marketer’s information. So a marketer has to use the tool of communication in a strong way. (Margaret, 2007)

Inseparability is also a distinctive characteristic of services which means services are provided and utilized at the same time. In a product, manufacturing, selling and consuming take place at different places. But in services everything happens at one place and it cannot be separated from their providers (Claessens, 2015).

Services show a perishable quality as well. They cannot be stored for future purposes. When it comes to products, if an organisation could not sell all their products on one day they can always store them for future sales. Product based businesses do not have to worry about excess stocks. But services have to be consumed right at that moment and excess cannot be stored. Management is the key requirement to avoid this kind of situations. Utilising only the needed amount of manpower is one of the ways to overcome this (BMS,