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Chapter 13: Customer Roles

This chapter builds up earlier attempts to close Gap 3 (the service delivery gap)

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PerceivedService

Expected Service

CUSTOMER

COMPANY

CustomerGap

Gap 1

Gap 2

Gap 3

External Communications

to CustomersGap 4ServiceDelivery

Customer-Driven Service Designs and

Standards

Company Perceptions of Consumer Expectations

Review: Gaps Model of Service Quality

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Provider Gap 1: Not knowing what customers expect

Provider Gap 2: Not selecting the right service designs and standards

Provider Gap 3: Not delivering to service standards

Provider Gap 4: Not matching performance to promises

Customer Expectations

Customer Perceptions

Factors Leadingto the Customer Gap

CustomerGap

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Customer Expectations

Company Perceptions of Customer Expectations

Inadequate marketing research orientation Insufficient marketing research Research not focused on service quality Inadequate use of market research

Lack of upward communication Lack of interaction between management and customers Insufficient communication between contact employees and managers Too many layers between contact personnel and top management

Insufficient relationship focus Lack of market segmentation Focus on transactions rather than relationships Focus on new customers rather than relationship customers

Inadequate service recovery Lack of encouragement to listen to customer complaints Failure to make amends when things go wrong No appropriate recovery mechanisms in place for service failures

Figure 2.2

Key Factors Leading to Provider Gap 1

Gap1

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Customer-Driven Service Designs and Standards

Management Perceptions of Customer Expectations

Poor service design Unsystematic new service development process Vague, undefined service designs

Failure to connect service design to service positioning Absence of customer-driven standards

Lack of customer-driven service standards Absence of process management to focus on customer

requirements Absence of formal process for setting service quality goals

Inappropriate physical evidence and servicescape Failure to develop tangibles in line with customer expectations Servicescape design that does not meet customer and

employee needs Inadequate maintenance and updating of the servicescape

Figure 2.3

Key Factors Leading to Provider Gap 2

Gap2

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Service Delivery

Customer-Driven Service Designs and Standards

Deficiencies in human resource policies Ineffective recruitment Role ambiguity and role conflict Poor employee-technology job fit Inappropriate evaluation and compensation systems Lack of empowerment, perceived control, and teamwork

Customers who do not fulfill roles Customers who lack knowledge of their roles and responsibilities Customers who negatively impact each other

Problems with service intermediaries Channel conflict over objectives and performance Difficulty controlling quality and consistency Tension between empowerment and control

Failure to match supply and demand Failure to smooth peaks and valleys of demand Inappropriate customer mix Overreliance on price to smooth demand

Figure 2.4

Key Factors Leading to Provider Gap 3

Gap3

Customers’ Roles in Service Delivery

The Importance of Customers in Service Delivery

Customers’ Roles

Self-Service Technologies—The Ultimate in Customer Participation

Strategies for Enhancing Customer Participation

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Table 13.1

Levels of Customer Participation across Different Services

Source: Adapted from A. R. Hubbert, “Customer Co-Creation of Service Outcomes: Effects of Locus of Causality Attributions,” doctoral dissertation, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, 1995.

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How Customers Widen theService Performance Gap

Lack of understanding of their roles

Not being willing or able to perform their roles

No rewards for “good performance”

Interfering with other customers

Incompatible market segments

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Importance of Other (“Fellow”) Customersin Service Delivery

Other customers can detract from satisfaction: disruptive behaviors overly demanding behaviors excessive crowding incompatible needs

Other customers can enhance satisfaction: mere presence socialization/friendships roles: assistants, teachers, supporters, mentors

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Customer “Roles” in Service Delivery

Productive Resources

Contributors to Service Quality and Satisfaction

Competitors

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Figure 13.2

Services Production Continuum

1 2 3 4 5 6

Gas Station Illustration1. Customer pumps gas and pays at the pump with automation2. Customer pumps gas and goes inside to pay attendant3. Customer pumps gas and attendant takes payment at the pump4. Attendant pumps gas and customer pays at the pump with automation5. Attendant pumps gas and customer goes inside to pay attendant6. Attendant pumps gas and attendant takes payment at the pump

Customer Production Joint Production Firm Production

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Customers as Productive Resources

customers can be thought of as “partial employees” contributing effort, time, or other resources to the production

process

customer inputs can affect organization’s productivity

key issue: should customers’ roles be expanded? reduced?

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Customers as Contributors toService Quality and Satisfaction

Customers can contribute to: their own satisfaction with the service

by performing their role effectively by working with the service provider

the quality of the service they receive by asking questions by taking responsibility for their own satisfaction by complaining when there is a service failure

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Customers as Competitors

customers may “compete” with the service provider

“internal exchange” vs. “external exchange”

internal/external decision often based on: expertise capacity resources capacity time capacity economic rewards psychic rewards trust control

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Figure 13.3

Strategies for Enhancing Customer Participation

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Strategies for EnhancingCustomer Participation

Define customers’ jobs helping oneself helping others promoting the company

Recruit, educate, and reward customers recruit the right customers educate and train customers to perform effectively reward customers for their contributions avoid negative outcomes of inappropriate customer participation

Manage the customer mix

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Table 13.2

Characteristics of Service that Increase the Importance of Compatible Segments

Source: Adapted from C. I. Martin and C. A. Pranter, “Compatibility Management: Customer-to-Customer Relationships in Service Environments,” Journal of Services Marketing, 3, no. 3 (Summer 1989), pp. 5–15.

Summary of Customers’ Roles in Service Delivery

The Importance of Customers in Service Delivery (Closing Gap 3)

Customer Roles

Self-Service Technologies—The Ultimate in Customer Participation

Strategies for Enhancing Customer Participation

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Exercise

Non-Compliance (see Text or Hand-out)

Who are the players?

What are the root causes?

What are some solutions?