Problems and strategies in service marketing

Published in: Journal of marketing

Cited by: 3000
The purposes of this article are:(1) to offer a conceptual framework summarizing
the unique characteristics of services, the problems stemming from these
characteristics, and the strategies suggested as appropriate to overcome the
problems; (2) to report the findings of a national survey of managers of service
firms concerning the problems they face and the marketing strategies they use to
overcome them; (3) to compare the problems and strategies cited in the literature
with those reported by managers of services firms; and (4) to offer
recommendations for the development of services marketing thought.






Measuring service quality in the hotel industry: A study in a business hotel in
Turkey
Published in: Hospitality Management
Cited by 2896
The role of service quality in the success of hotel businesses cannot be denied. It is
vital for the hotel managers to have a good understanding on what exactly the
customers want. Identifying the specific expectations of customers, the dimensions
of the service quality, and their relative importance for customers for each specific
segment of hotel industry would definitely help managers in the challenge of
improving the service quality. The objectives of this study were to investigate the
service quality expectations of business hotels customers, examine whether the
quality dimensions included in the SERVQUAL model apply in an international
environment, search for any additional dimensions that should be included in the
service quality construct, and measure the level of importance of each specific
dimension for the customers of the business hotels. The findings of this study
confirmed the five-dimensional structure of SERVQUAL; however, some of the
dimensions found and their components were different from SERVQUAL. The five
service quality dimensions identified in this study were named as tangibles,
adequacy in service supply, understanding and caring, assurance, and
convenience. The findings showed that business travelers had the highest
expectations for the dimension of convenience followed by assurance,
tangibles, adequacy in service supply, and understanding and caring. The
research findings also confirmed that, although the SERVQUAL scale was a very
useful tool as a concept, it needed to be adapted for the specific service segments and
for the cultural context within which it was used.
Keywords: SERVQUAL; Service quality; Hospitality industry; Business hotels
Branding a B2b service: Does a brand differentiate a logistic service provider?
Published in: Industrial Marketing Management
Cited by: 5435
Existing research has shown that strong brands serve as an important point of
differentiation for firms, assisting customers in their evaluation and choice
processes. Although there is considerable research on the branding of consumer
goods and an increasing literature on industrial and service brands, little is known
about branding in the context of business-to-business services. This research extends
existing brand theory to a new setting, namely B2B services. Drawing on the results
of two mail surveys, we examine B2B services branding in the context of logistics
services. Findings suggest that brands do differentiate the offerings of logistics
service providers and that brand equity exists for this commodity-like B2B service.
Findings also support the extendibility of Keller's [Keller, K. L. (1993).
Conceptualizing, measuring, and managing customer-based brand equity. Journal
of Marketing, 57(1), 122] brand equity framework into the logistics services
context. However, results of this study show that; logistics service providers and
their customers have different perspectives on the relative influence of brand image
and brand awareness on brand equity. Implications of these findings for managers
and directions for future research are offered. 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights
reserved.

Keywords: B2B brand equity; B2B services; Services branding; Logistics services