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CHAPTER

10Managing SportTourismExperiences:BlueprintingService EncountersChris A. Vassiliadis andAnestis Fotiadis

ABSTRACT

Purpose � This chapter aims to present and analyze how themethodology/approach of service blueprinting may contri-bute to managing and offering high quality experiences tosport tourists.

Methodology/approach � In this study we use a combinationof theoretical tools to develop a finalized services blueprintmap for sport events. The method consists of a literaturereview and a presentation of empirical findings. First, using acase study, we present the process through which a small-scale sport event blueprint map was constructed. Secondly,based on a meeting with the management staff and the use ofdiaries, we analyze the comments of tourists in the sport eventarea. Thirdly, we compare and describe the main contactpoints between the front-line staff and sport event tourists ina service blueprint. Finally we apply the six dimensional con-struct domain analysis of service experiences and combinethis information in a table format for the Failure, Effect, andAction analysis.

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Findings � This study shows that observation, diaries, serviceblueprints, comment management, and FMEA (FailureMode and Effects Analysis) are a range of corporate researchapproaches and management tools that can offer newinsights into the theory and praxis of service managementapplications and can improve the experiences of sportstourists.

Research limitations/implications � This study is related tosport rural events. Researchers have to check with the samemethod to study the results also in other sport events.

Practical implications � The analysis of Small-Scale SportEvent Services Blueprinting can be combined with otheruseful managerial tools, like the Failure Mode and EffectsAnalysis to better manage the contact points, the “momentsof truth” of tourist experiences in the sport event service sys-tem. In addition, the SMF case study shows that it is usefulto point out the problematic areas in the service system usingcombined methods and managerial tools with the aim ofenhancing and contributing to better manage sport tourismevent experiences.

Originality/value � It presents the new idea of combining the-oretical constructs and measurement tools in order to blue-print, analyze, and create service customer experiences.

Keywords: Sport tourism; experiences; services blueprinting;failure mode and effects analysis

IntroductionAccording to Gibson (1998, p. 49) Sport Tourism can be definedas “leisure-based travel that takes individuals temporarily outsideof their home communities to participate in physical activities, towatch physical activities, or to venerate attractions associatedwith physical activities.” Participation in sport and tourismevents can create unique leisure experiences for the participants(Perić, 2010; Ritchie & Adair, 2004). More and more small-scaleevents have been established over the last few years in an attemptto boost the economies of depressed countries and rural towns(Gibson, Kaplanidou, & Kang, 2012). Many other researchers

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have shown that sport events can affect a destination bothsocially and economically (Snelgrove & Wood, 2010). These des-tinations create sport events that will encourage the participationof non-professional or professional sport-tourists, promote localservices, and encourage the consumption of local products andsupport involvement in local activities. As Higham (1999) men-tioned, small-scale sports events usually function and operatewithin existing infrastructures, require minimal investment ofpublic funds, and can generate a reliable and regular flow of visi-tors. Furthermore, these kind of events seem to minimize theeffects of seasonality. Gibson, Willming, and Holdnak (2003)assert that these events are suitable for small or medium sizedcommunities since they can provide proportionately more eco-nomic benefits than if they were conducted in larger cities.

For the service provider, customer participation can lead to theavoidance and minimization of their non-customer-oriented mis-takes in the service delivery process but can also lead, through thecontinuing blueprinting service improvement system, to a higherquality output that sustains their customer markets on a long-termbasis. Literature about small sport events and blueprinting servicesdoes not sufficiently highlight the basic processes that can be a scriptof small-scale sport event visitor behavior and their basic outdooractivities. This chapter aims to present and analyze how the metho-dology/approach of service blueprint may contribute to managingand offering high quality experiences to sport tourists.

Service Quality: Managing PerceptionsMany enterprises try to formulate and implement StrategicMarketing Planning with the aim of competing in the ServiceIndustry Environment. The market competitiveness of a serviceenterprise can be built over the years if enterprises clearly focuson customer purchasing behavior. Service Quality is a key factorin designing service products because it is mostly related to non-tangible aspects of the services that affect the Satisfaction leveland Loyalty behavior of customers (Chang & Chen, 1998;Cronin & Taylor, 1992; Gammie, 1992; Gummesson, 1998;Hallowell, 1996; Lasser, Manolis, & Winsor, 2000; Leonard &Sasser, 1982; Newman, 2001; Seth, Deshmukh, & Vrat, 2005;Sureshchander, Rajendran, & Anatharaman, 2002). Service sys-tems, like sport events activities, should be efficient at deliveringservices at a high level (Berry, Parasuraman, Zeithaml, & Adsit,

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1994; Hung, Huang, & Chen, 2003). In addition, based onTeece’s notification, this kind of service model approach, likeother business models, must be “honed to meet particular custo-mer needs” (Teece, 2010, p. 192); If this is the managerial pointthe Service quality analysis can help to make the business modelsmore customer-oriented (Andronikidis, Bellou, & Vassiliadis,2008; Teece, 2010). Service quality analysis is based on the eva-luation of two basic perceived aspects of service quality, namelythe functional (Demand oriented service analysis, like customerevaluations of service attributes, consumer experiences per con-tact point, customer attitudes) and technical quality (Supply-oriented service analysis like technical systems, staff and skills,technology being used, etc.) aspects (Grönroos, 1984, 1991).Functional service quality is based on customer evaluations, theseevaluations are the result of the comparison between the level ofservice quality expected and the level of service quality finallyexperienced from the delivery system of the service provider(Grönroos, 1991). Studies have pointed out that there are impor-tant direct relationships between, Perceived service quality (PSQ),Perceived customer value (PCV), Willingness to buy (WB), andCustomer Perceptions (CP). More specifically, based on thosestudies, PSQ has a direct effect on PCV, Functional ServiceQuality as a part of the PSQ construct positively affectsTechnical service quality and Customer WB (Oh, 1999; Sethet al., 2005; Sweeney, Soutar, & Johnson, 1997). The Analysis ofthe Functional or Perceived Service Quality is based on attributes,which are important for customer service. The research work ofParasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1985) is widely known to theresearch community and services business practice. Their firstexploratory research analysis study, based on the results of 12focus group studies, revealed a bundle of ten “potentially over-lapping quality dimensions,” namely the initial SERVQUAL itempool of 10 dimensions with 97 items for evaluation. Those tendimensions were tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, communi-cation, credibility, security, competence, courtesy, understandingand knowing the customer, and access (Parasuraman et al.,1985). In their following work the researchers used the FactorAnalysis approach and Reliability Analysis to handle theproblems of dimension purification and the refining of theirrelated items. Following this approach they proposed a globalmeasurement model of service quality analyses using five distinctservice quality measurement dimensions, namely tangibles,reliability, responsibility, assurance, and empathy (Parasuraman,



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Zeithaml, & Berry, 1988). This approach and many other researchapproaches are based on the idea that a service must be well definedby the service provider because service managers need to knowhow customers perceive the service quality of their service (Fotiadis& Vassiliadis, 2013) for service planning improvement purposes.These dimensions are very helpful for evaluating and improving theservice quality delivery process and the perceived functionallyfocused service quality process. In this manner those quality dimen-sions can be an index for blueprinting, evaluating, developingunderstanding of managerial implications and developing long-term improvement in service products.

Service Encounters and Servicescapes:BlueprintingService encounters are “periods of time during which them a con-sumer directly interacts with a service” (Shostack, 1985, p. 243).They are the “service from the customer’s point of view” (Bitner,1990, p. 69). Solomon, Surprenant, Czepiel, and Gutman (1985)noted that it is important to create compatible service scriptswith the scope to have a more realistic and clear vision about thewhole service processes between the service providers and thecustomers. Blueprinting service encounters can be a useful toolfor enforcing the empirical work that has been done and must becontinued for the examination and consideration of the non-coreattributes of service offerings, such as physical evidence of thesupply and demand exchange environment, “Servicescapes,” orthe physical surroundings in which a service process takes placeand where the service provider and the customer interact (Bitner,1992; Rosenbaum, 2005; Zeithaml & Bitner, 2003). As shownin the different studies mentioned above, the Service Quality vari-able has a significant effect on customer satisfaction, loyalty andbehavior. Service Quality includes Servicescapes that can bedefined as a facility’s exterior, for example, landscape design,weather conditions, outdoor emotional effects (smelling, hearing,etc.), signs, and interior characteristics, for example, ambiance,interior design, look and type of other customers and staff, inter-ior design. Servicescapes can be organized in an open space oroutdoor physical environment (i.e., outdoor sport tourism activ-ities) or they can be a synthesis of exterior and interior spaces(i.e., Summer resorts; Hotel and recreation villages). Blueprinting



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can help the service managers to avoid omissions and mistakeslike “flawed identification of customer needs,” “errors in creatingquality standards,” “errors in designing the service” and errorsbecause of the implementation of “inadequate business adminis-tration models” (Cetina, 2009). Service encounters and blueprint-ing can describe the pitfalls of the service delivery process(Brown & Bitner, 2007). Service blueprinting is a managerialapproach used to clarify and enforce the practical aspects ofservice process design, analysis and improvement (Bitner,Ostrom, & Morgan, 2008). As a process oriented approach itconsists of points of customer contact, physical evidence andrelated services provided to the customers. Services are analyti-cally presented as onstage/visible contact employee actions,backstage/invisible contact employee actions and support pro-cesses that are important in supporting the customer-oriented ser-vice offer (Bitner et al., 2008; Kingman-Brundage, George, &Bowen, 1995; Shostack, 1992). Those levels of analyses are impor-tant for creating the everyday management praxis, which servicesblueprint maps. In the next case we implement this approach inorder to build the final blueprint map for the Sfendami MountainFestival (SMF) small-scale sport event. Customer contact-point ser-vice improvement based on service blueprints can create value forthe active customers. A service provider can also enjoy some bene-fits from contact-point service improvement strategies, that is,through co-production, co-creation, synergies, or “co-value crea-tion”; because he requires less managerial effort for the coordina-tion of the service processes (Gummesson, 1994; Johnston &Clark, 2001; Vargo & Lusch, 2008). For the service provider thisparticipation can lead to the avoidance and minimization of hisnon-customer-oriented mistakes in the service delivery process butalso can lead, through the continuing blueprinting service improve-ment system, to higher quality output that sustains their customermarkets on a long-term basis (Edvardsson, 1997).

Tourist Experience and SatisfactionLiterature suggests that quality measurement procedures mustemphasize the quality of service experience that can explain thehigh portion of variance in satisfaction level evaluations (Chen &Chen, 2010; Kao, Huang, & Wu, 2008; Oliver, 1993). It is impor-tant to recognize the extraordinary experience that can be offeredby extended leisure and tourism pursuits (Otto & Ritchie, 1996).



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Managers can evaluate tourist experiences using e-technology likesmartphones apps, web pages and e-mail lists, and e-mail commu-nication (Jin, Lee, & Lee, 2015). The challenge in “Serviscapes”like the local small-scale tourism sport events, will in the future liein the processes that can reform the tourist’s experience of service,encounter, delivery, and environmental features. There is also aneed to measure and understand the tourist’s feelings. Otto &Ritchie, in their research work (1996), point out six dimensionsthat can contribute to the measurement and management of theaffective components of the service experience, for example, thetourist feelings, namely the Hedonic (Excitement, Enjoyment, andMemorability), Interactive (Meeting people, Being part of the pro-cess, Having choice), Novelty (Escape, Doing something new),Comfort (Physical comfort, Relaxation), Safety (Personal safety,Security of belongings), and Stimulation (Educational andInformative, Challenging).

The Case of SMF, 2013: The Analysisof Sport Event Tourism Experiencesin PracticeThis study presents and analyzes the SMF, a small-scale tourismsport event. To achieve this we used the services blueprintingmethod and an FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis). Thestudy tries to identify the service process and the related contactpoints of a real small-scale sport event case study based on theclassical service blueprint theoretical construct. Second, the studytries to determine which actions improve the satisfaction levels ofcustomers and which events can be improved by the service man-ager so as to avoid the high customer dissatisfaction levels thatcan affect the service quality strategy of an event provider. SMFis a two-day event organized every year during April atSfendami, Pieria. The organizer is SFENDAMOS, a local non-profit company based in Sfendami in the region of Pieria,Northern Greece. In 2013 the event was being held for the 7thyear. The aim of the event is to offer athletes, runners, mountainbikers, children, parents, and spectators, with a love of athleticsand nature, as well as an experience of the area. The Hill ofProphet Elias where the festival will take place includes a camp-site and immediate access to the race routes and tracks, as well as



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more events and new activities (Figure 2). The hill is 2.5 km fromSfendami. There are WC facilities and showers with hot waterfor the athletes and campers. There are eating and drinking facil-ities for all. The organizer offers the visitors a user friendly infor-mative website in two languages (SMF, 2013).

MethodologyAfter a meeting with the management staff of SFENDAMOS, theauthors built a list with basic contact points that are visible andwhich follows the activities that the visitors usually complete dur-ing their SMF participation. This information was critical for the

Ad/web site (be informed and participate with online registration, pay the participation fees)

Small train station area (park the car in the village and continue with the local train)

Outdoor parking area (arrival at the train parking area or at the car parking area near the sport event arena)

Secretary & front office services (check in, check or pay the registration fees, take information and the athlete’s handbag with visitor and athlete’s instructions, competition

routes and rules, the athlete’s competition number, sport and sponsored accessories)

Starting gate point in the sport arena (Exploring the area of the competition. Tour of thestarting point and of the related services and facilities near the starting Gate; warming up)

Management office and related activities (Giving attention to the competition rules and the running route)

Starting and finishing: finish line in the sport arena (Running competition: Run, finish and take a handmade SMF medal)

Management office and related activities (during the finish give the responsible staff someinformation about you and the running competition you have finished, be informed about the

status of the competition and the total time of athlete’s integrated running route)

Secretary & front office services (check your final running time, take information about theother actions that you have to follow after ending the running route)

WC douche & bathroom area (meet physical needs, body care and hygiene)

Media, V.I.P. & medal ceremony event on the central outdoor stage (participate in awards,video creation and photo taking, stroll through the exhibition area)

Pasta party & music event area (participate to the pasta party and the music event)

Outdoor parking area (return to car or to the train station and depart)

Figure 1. Flow Chart of the SMF Sport Event.



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design of the physical evidence and customer actions in the ser-vice blueprinting approach (Figures 1�3). After the meeting 13basic visible service provider and customer contact points, as wellas the related activities that the small-scale sport tourists follow,were identified. Teamwork was very useful in preparing the finalSMF blueprint map (Bitner et al., 2008). We present the fivelevels of the blueprint analysis, namely the Physical evidence, theCustomer actions, the Onstage/visible Contact Employee actions,the Backstage/invisible employee actions and the Support pro-cesses of the SMF (2013) small tourism sport scale event inFigure 3. Moreover in our study we also use the services blue-printing method incorporating it with a Failure Mode and EffectsAnalysis (FMEA) (Seyring, Dornberger, Suveltza, & Byrnes,2009). The FMEA process consists of three basic steps, namelythe “Identification of processes and problematic areas,”“Analysis with emphasis on the potential consequences” andfinally “Action steps with the aim of identifying strategies” toavoid failures and problematic service processes per contact point

Figure 2. The Area Map of the SMF Starting and Finishing Point.



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Figure 3. Service Blueprint of a Visit to the SMF Small-Scale Sport Event.

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between customers and employees. The analysis is based on theevaluation of ten contact � point events (or else “moments oftruth” for creating the tourist experience), (see also table 1Service encounters: Positive and Negative Comments). For the“analysis of the potential consequences” we used Otto andRitchie’s (1996) six dimensional construct domain of serviceexperience theory. The structure of this chapter ends with a pro-posal about the next steps that could be taken. In this last sectionthe emphasis is on service strategy application and proposals toavoid future service blueprint failures that are related to specificcontact points in the small-scale sport service system.

Diary DesignDiaries are useful tools for observation and tourist research parti-cipation (observation and tourist’s comment selection) in a nat-ural environment like the sport event area (Marino, Minichiello,& Browne, 2004). We finalized the diary style and format afterchecking the structural and design specifications for the specificsport event. In our diaries during the SMF (2013) event we devel-oped descriptions and analyses for each time block, for the cur-rent situation and for the activities of the tourists in the sportevent area. In addition, through observation and interviews, weidentified the tourists’ comments per contact-point. We used26 field workers for the two-day period (April 20�21, 2013),with the aim of selecting, through observation and interviews,important comments that can help the management to evaluatetheir service in the natural environment of the SMF (2013) sportevent arena. Each researcher noted by observation and commentselection important episodes and events per contact-point area.For each observation the procedure included notes about theresearcher, the day of selection, the contact-point and the timeframe of each observation of the research study. Additionally,in the main body of the diary the procedure included a semi-structured questionnaire with an open-ended format for indicat-ing the customer comments per time block (from 8.00 until20.00 with the use of six 2-hour time zones).

After the service process simulation, the description of theSMF services processes in a flow chart and in the Blueprint map(Figures 1�3) began. The main aim of the study approach was toprocess and analyze the Positive and Negative tourist commentsper contact-point. As we have mentioned above those comments



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are the “experience moments” that the researchers selected percontact point based on their research diaries during the SMFevent (Figure 4). In the service blueprint map we used the servicestaxonomy process of the five basic levels, namely Physical evi-dence, Customer actions, Onstage/visible Contact Employeeactions, Backstage/invisible employee actions and Support pro-cesses (Bitner et al., 2008). The analysis of customer commentsabout service provision is a crucial point for this study because ithelps failure point identification, related service design, and helpsimprove managerial decisions. In this part of our analysis webuilt a table to give a short account of the basic events that canhave a positive and negative effect on the satisfaction level of thetourists. As mentioned above in the literature section, the tour-ists’ satisfaction status is related with the tourists’ experience andthe related service contact points. After the selection of the events(based on the above comments) and their categorization per con-tact-point we developed the table mentioned above with the aimof having a synopsis of those critical moments. As we can seefrom table 1, 81.6% (31/38 events) of the diary events can nega-tively affect the satisfaction level of the tourists.

Using a combination of the above mentioned diary data pooland a table format for negative and positive aspects that affect thesatisfaction status of the tourists; we are in a good position toidentify negative events/experiences. In our study those are the:two (Secretary and Front Office services: Meeting and information/internet service), four (Catering area), five (Fun fair; ChildrenPlayground Area), six (Small Train Station Area), and nine (WC,Douche & Bathroom area) (Figure 4). Failures are identified inall the basic 10 contact points but we have identified only nega-tive events/experiences in those five above. Next it is important togo forward with the identification of the potential consequencesof each failure. To avoid a non-visitor-friendly atmosphere (i.e.,Servicescape or Physical Environment) that can affect the satisfac-tion level and the whole experience of the visitors and of coursetheir related loyalty and word of mouth, it is critical to invest inthe improvement of the quality of Servicescape elements that canaffect the tourists’ experience (Laws, 1998).

Next we present the negative event(s) per contact-point, thecharacteristics that are related to the affective or emotional partof the service experience, and finally the potential consequencesusing Otto and Ritchie’s (1996) six dimensional constructdomain of service experience theory. Recognizing those basicrelations we have built a table to give a synopsis of the Failure(s),



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Figure 4. SMF Research Study: Service Encounters and Positive/Negative Experiences and Episodes. Note: The number of the contact point is theservice point in the area map (see the related area map before). Here, we only present the researcher diary comments that had negative or positivecomments about the basis contact points.

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Experience, Consequence(s)/Effects, and Management Actions(Figure 5).

ConclusionsTourism sport event managers, can be encouraged, through theuse of blueprints, to check all of the internal support systemsand technological aspects of an event, as well as the employee-customer interactions that are required to create a distinctive cus-tomer experience. This chapter shows that observation, diaries,service blueprints, comment management and FMEA (FailureMode and Effects Analysis) can act as a range of corporateresearch elements and management tools that give new insightinto the theory and the praxis of tourism small-scale sport eventcustomer and experience focused management applications. Thecase study shows that that synthesis of different tools can offeran alternative approach for services blueprinting improvement-planning procedures that arise from a diary based selection ofcomments. These comments reflect the problematic areas (fail-ures) in different contact points of a service blueprint system. Themanagement of the contact points in this blueprint system can becoordinated more easily, if we know those problematic areas thatnegatively affect the whole tourist experience. As the literaturereview shows, those dimensions develop the experience constructand can be qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed to give indepth information about the important aspects of, and the con-text of, the tourist experience. Given that these dimensions areimportant aspects in planning and organizing the customer qual-ity improvement strategy of the event (see 3rd column ofFigure 5), the management can build a long-term data pool aboutthe failures and effects with the aim of avoiding similar circum-stances and situations that may occur in the future and can affectsatisfaction, word of mouth, the tourist experience and touristloyalty, and hence the sustainability of the small-scale sport event(see “actions” in 5th column of the Figure 5). At the same timethe positive comments can be the stable and diachronically sus-tainable competitive advantages of the SMF event product (seepositive factors that affect the tourist satisfaction in Figure 4).The above analysis focuses mainly on how the methodology/approach of service blueprint may contribute to managing andoffering high quality experiences to sport tourists. The analysisof Services Blueprinting can be combined with other useful



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Figure 5. Failure(s), Experience, Consequence(s)/Effects, and Actions for the SMF Study. Note: Where failure code(s) are the related codenumbers of the failures in Figure 4.

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managerial tools, like the Failure Mode and Effects Analysis tobetter manage the contact points, the “moments of truth” oftourist experiences in the sport event service system. In addition,the SMF case study shows that it is useful to point out the proble-matic areas in the service system using combined methods andmanagerial tools with the aim of enhancing and contributing tobetter managed sport tourism event experiences.

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