Competitive Trends in Service Marketing

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses the most dominant trends influencing the development of service marketing strategies today, including the recognition that it is more important than ever to foster trust. The author describes how customer satisfaction research has attempted the quantification of trust. Four recommendations are provided to companies looking to increase customer satisfaction. It is most critical to develop strategies for attaining the highest levels possible of transparency and trust with customers, and this includes going after the areas of social media and social networking, such as blogs, which have unfolded as the new reputation management system.

Table of Contents:
Executive Summary
Background and Introduction
Main Conclusions
Recommendations
Table of Contents
Trends in Services Marketing Regarding Customer Satisfaction
Background
Creating Trustworthy Moments of Truth with Customers
Consistency Makes a Services Company Trustworthy
Quantifying and Measuring Customer Service using Analytics
Customer Satisfaction in the B2B Environment
Future Trends
Limitations, Conclusions and Recommendations

From the Paper:

"Services marketing is in the midst of a revolution today as social media has become more powerful than ever, giving customers a stronger voice than they have ever had. Bloggers are the new social media voice globally, and have already shown how powerful their voices are across many industries. Dell Computer had sold a defective system to a blogger in San Francisco, and his discussion of the faceless, careless responses Dell made to him through auto-generated responses erupted into the most linked-to site on the Internet during the summer of 2006 when the incident occurred."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Crutchfield, T (2007). Individual Service Providers vs. the Firm: Where Do Customer Loyalties Lie? Services Marketing Quarterly, 29(2), 19. Retrieved March 4, 2008, from ABI/INFORM Global database. (Document ID: 1430139541).
• Tyler, K & Stanley, E (2007). The role of trust in financial services business relationships. The Journal of Services Marketing, 21(5), 334-344. Retrieved March 4, 2008, from ABI/INFORM Global database. (Document ID: 1363456891).
• Desai, P., Kalra, A., Murthi, P. (2008). When Old Is Gold: The Role of Business Longevity in Risky Situations. Journal of Marketing, 72(1), 95. Retrieved March 4, 2008, from ABI/INFORM Global database. (Document ID: 1412916721).
• Lofgren, M (2005). Winning at the first and second moments of truth: an exploratory study. Managing Service Quality, 15(1), 102-115. Retrieved March 4, 2008, from ABI/INFORM Global database. (Document ID: 806684681).
• Zolkiewski, J., Lewis, B., Yuan, F., Yuan, J.. (2007) An assessment of customer service in business-to-business relationships. The Journal of Services Marketing, 21(5), 313-325. Retrieved March 4, 2008, from ABI/INFORM Global database. (Document ID: 1363456911).

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