Question

Individually, students will read 3-5 journal / research articles that pertain to marketing a service (as opposed to a product). Students will then write a report synthesizing those articles. APA methodology applies to this assignment.

Answer 1

Report on the Synthesis of Service Marketing:
Service marketing is a concept in services' and operations management which lais emphasis on creating awareness, among the customers about the service being provided by the bussiness organization through promotion, positioning and various other tools.
The services can be marketed by providing solutions to the customers' difficulties or problems thereby emerging as a brand.
Service marketing can be done on two channel basis :
1) The first being the " service provider to the customer" also called B2C basis, e.g a salon or a boutique shop where customers arrive for a makeover.
2) The another being the " business to business" i.e B2B basis , where one bussiness organisation emerges to provide services to the another business entity. E.g. A business hires a market reaserch company to conduct the reasearch of its potential market.

Services unlike products are intangible i.e not having any physical existence , thus services cannot be measured in terms of quantity. Services however can be felt , or their outcome can be seen , in the form of solution to the problem e.g a car mechanic repairs a car .
Therefore service marketing can put a major impact on the business entity indulged in providing services.

The most important thing about the Service marketing is that unlike products services cannot be alike or same , services have an important attribute of variability , each service offered varies from each other in terms of effectiveness, satisfaction, time consumption, etc even when the services have been provided by the same individual and the subject matter of service is also same.
E.g the lecture provided by the teacher in the morning will be different or will vary from the one provided by the same teacher in the afternoon.
Thus services cannot be produced exactly alike. Therefore service marketer needs to aim at providing even better services than before by regular addition of the values to increase the satisfaction level. Various factors like store Ambiance affability, welcoming nature, courtesy, and positive attitude can trigger the emotions of the clients and increase their chances of revisits.

An important aspect of service marketing is a long term relationship with customers and an adequate consideration of their needs, priorities , etc.

The service marketing takes into cognisance , 7 p's of marketing which include :
Physical existence or ambiance,
People or clients
Process or the Method
Place
Product (service)
Price
Promotion

Unlike products , the service are produced and consumed at same place e.g serving food in restaurants , a medical check up in a hospital etc.
Moreover services like products cannot be transfered or stored. Thetefore their marketing to provide maximum benefits in the moment or during the prescribed time.

Service location plays an important role in service marketing, as the clients have to physically visit or take the resources which requires a service to the place of service because services are location based (except for some like virtual teaching classes) etc., therefore the convenience with which these centres are available and their location plays an important part in service marketing .

The articles further represented the fact that in service marketing the service once offered cannot be invalidated or taken back thetefore , service marketing should include free trials or demo that would enable the client to evaluate the service being provided and whether it will suit him or her ..

Another important aspect of Service marketing as reflected by the artciles i went through is that services can be easily customized as per the requirements of the customers and do not generally follow a rigid outcome like the manfacturing of the product.

Service marketing can prove a little difficult as in case of marketing a product , the response from customers is quick as it is basically human nature to react or respond to the tangible things looking attractive , catching attention or similar to one's preferences more quickly than the intangible things which can be only experienced or felt thus might require some time to process or evalaute

Thankyou..

Hope i made it up to the mark ....u can add or edit if required

God luck and God bless.

:)