Services Marketing - Essay Example

Even in emerging economics, services output is growing rapidly and often represents at least half of GDP (World Bank, 1996). In developed countries, knowledge based services - defined as those that are intensive uses of high technology and/or have relatively highly skilled workforces are providing the most dynamic components (Peneder, Kaniovsky and Dachs, 2003, 47-66). What is service: A service is an act or performance offered by one party to another. Although the process may be tied to a physical product, the performance is transitory, often intangible in nature, and does not normally result in ownership of any of the factors of production.

So it has been very clear that In the case of goods, the benefits come from ownership of physical objects or devices, whereas in services the benefits are created by actions or performances (Bery, 1980). The dynamic environment of services today places a premium on effective marketing. Christian Gronsoos (2001) argues that service-marketing function is much broader than the activities and output of the traditional marketing department, requiring close cooperation between marketers and those managers responsible for operations and human resources (Gronsoos, 2001, 26-27).

To run on efficient operation Employees must be customer oriented in addition to being concerned about efficiency. The service product must be tailored to customer needs, priced realistically, distributed through convenient channels, and actively promoted to customers. Difference of service marketing: Marketing management tasks in services sector tend to differ from those in manufacturing sector in several important respects i.e. in services customer do not obtain ownership of services, service product are ephemeral and cannot be inventoried, intangible element dominate value creation, customers may be involved in the production process, other people may form part of the product, there is greater variability in operational inputs and outputs, many services are difficult for customers to evaluate, the time factor assumes great importance and distribution channel takes different forms.

Although it's useful to distinguish marketing, it's also important to recognize that there are marketing relevant differences among services themselves. Types of services: Numerous proposals have been made for classifying services (Lovelock, 1983, 9-20). A particularly significant classification is based on the processes by which services are created and delivered. By looking at service processes from a purely operational perspective, we can categorized into four main categories i.e. people processing includes our company i.e. Hotel industry specifically Radisson Hotel & Resorts, the service directed by people's bodies, possession processing, the service directed at physical possessions include Transportation, warehousing etc.

, Mental stimulus processing i.e. services directed at people's mind includes Advertisement/PR, entertainment, education etc. and information processing, the services directed at intangible assets include Banking, data processing, legal service etc. Nothing can alter the fact that people processing services require the customer to be physically present with in the service premises, in our case in the Hotel. When customers visit a service factory (Hotel), their satisfaction