03a consumer perceptions & expectations-s

SERVICES MARKETINGSERVICES MARKETINGConsumer Expectations & Perceptions

Customer Expectations

The customer when buys a product or service has expectations about;

• Reliability of performance

• Quality

These expectations can be low or high at different scales of rating that a customer will use depending upon the choices / affordability available.

Levels of Expectations

The levels of expectations could be;

a. The desired level – the customer expects from the provider, depending upon what he has learnt from various sources and the price of the service

b. Adequate level – the level of service the customer will accept

The desired and the adequate levels of expectations of service will vary for different categories of service that he is looking forward to.


Zone of Tolerance

Services are heterogeneous and the performance may therefore vary across providers or the same provider

The customers by nature therefore recognise this and willingly accept certain variations. This variation is known as the “Zone of Tolerance”

However different customers possess different zones of tolerance – Every customer may not be having knowledge or the competing services available and therefore among the customers the tolerance zones may vary

Zone of tolerance will also vary with the Service Dimensions – In the case of eating out, one customer may be looking for quality of food, but does not mind delay in service while someone in a hurry may get annoyed due to delayed service


Factors influencing Expectations of Service

• Sources of Desired Service Expectations – the sources could be;

o Personal Needs – in categories like physical, social, psychological and functional.

Adopt a Strategy to educate customers as to how your services help them

o Enduring Service Intensifiers (Derived Service Expectations) – when the expectations are driven by another person or group of persons e.g. the Marketing Manager of a company arranging lunch to be joined by the customers, CEO and other senior executives. He has to therefore see that the place, menu etc. are as per the liking or expected liking of the people joining the lunch

Use MR to determine expectations/profile information for designing services

Focus on advertising and marketing strategies


• Sources of Adequate Service Expectations –

o Transitory Service Intensifiers – emergency situations in which a particular service is needed – when queue gets long for the customers or a breakdown of car happens, all what you need is to get the vehicle going

Increase service delivery persons, and if you understand by experience, provide more strength of service people

o Perceived Service Alternatives – if service provider is not available, you have to get the service from the available one and be satisfied as adequate service level

Be aware of what the customers want or what competition is capable of


o Self Perceived Service Role – when you are in knowledge of the service, you will or will not take the quality of service e.g. if you are a good cook, probably you can find ten faults in the food

Educate customers that their participation can only improve results

o Situational Factors – In a riot torn city when the number of injured are many, whatever medical service you get at that time of emergency, you accept that as adequate

Assure customers about services recovery regardless of situational factors

o Predicted Service – is the service levels that the customers believe are likely to receive. Some people expect the service levels to be higher while some expect lower and accordingly adequate level is influenced

Explain customers so that future encounters are not estimated wrong


Sources of DESIRED and PREDICTED Service Expectations

o Explicit Service promises – are the non personal statements made by the organisations in print, advertisements or any other form and are personal when made by the sales persons

Make only realistic promises to customers

Get as fair information as possible before releasing advertisements or printing leaflets

Formalise promises and get feedback from the employees, s to how many times failure occurs on promises

o Implicit Service promises – are the ones that lead to inferences what the service would be like. These may be due to higher / lower prices or impressive tangibles

Service tangibles should reflect type and level of service

Price premiums being charged from the customers must be justified by higher levels of performances


o Word-of-mouth communication – these may be personal or non-personal references by friends, customers or others

Simulate the word of mouth by using testimonials from the customers/ from opinion leaders

o Past Experiences – the previous exposures to service may influence the expectations which may be below or above the expected levels

Use MR or feedback from the employees on the past experiences of the customers


Customer Perceptions

In Service Marketing, Perception can be defined as “Customers’ Judgment “ about the service experience pertaining to value of the service delivery, quality and customer satisfaction

Perceptions change over a period of time, from person to person, from one culture to another etc

Service Encounters are the most important factors

Perceptions primarily are influenced by service encounters i.e. a person going to bank and encounters (meets) various people of different levels and based on his experience, perceptions are formed


Types of Service encounters

There are three types of service encounters;

Remote encounters – are the ones where direct human contact is not involved

e.g. ATM machines, voice mail service, online dealings

Phone encounters – customer service centres for getting information, feedback, complaints booking etc

Face to face encounters – in hotels with the staff at various places, restaurants, banks, stores etc

Evaluation of Service Encounters result in either satisfaction or dissatisfaction and influence their perceptions


While the customers encounter with the service provider, certain factors influence the customers, causing satisfaction or dissatisfaction. Following are some of the factors;

Recovery – is the situation when failure occurs and then how well the service provider responded to the situation

e.g. Flight delay, delay in serving food, wrong service of dishes, wrong booking of the room in hotel

the service provider must listen to the customers patiently, analyse the problem at hand, if the mistake is clearly of the company, accept and explain the reason, apologize and assure customers to correct the mistake. If the problem is big enough, offer additional benefits to satisfy them. This will reinforce confidence in the customers


Adaptability – is the ability to deal with the special request or needs of his customers

e.g. request of overdraft in a bank, special diet to patients on a flight

Not all the time you have to say “that’s company policy”. You need to be flexible and as far as possible accept feasible requests. That’s why one of the important aspect is empowering the employee to settle any disputable situation

Spontaneity – voluntary action of employees while delivering the service to customers as required on the spot

e.g. in case of delay in flight, announcing snacks/coffee to the passengers, certain restaurants offer additional drinks while the waiting is long for the already booked tables

The employee should listen, show empathy and again it is empowering the employees to take certain flexible approach to the situations before it flares up into a dispute


Coping – is the process of how employees manage “Problem Customer” effectively

here the customers are themselves the problem and the employees need to pacify agitated and disturbed customers

In such situations listen to them, try to accommodate, give explanations to satisfy and still if the customer does not understand, let go off

Service Evidence

Since the services are intangibles, the providers must manage even the minute tangible clues associated with the service. The evidence may be of three types;

1. Service personnel – the ability of the person to be friendly and enthusiastic will make the service tangible


2. Process of service delivery – is the process of service delivery and the flow of operations

placing order at fast food and then waiting for the token number to be called for delivery

3. Physical Environment – the ambience offered by the service provider

Going to a place for meals where the ambience is good (peaceful or crowded or loud music)

03a consumer perceptions & expectations-s

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