In various articles related to services branding, there is debate on whether services branding process differs from the more traditional product branding process.
According to Teemu Moilanen, service branding does not differ much from customer perspective but rather on the company side.
Why service branding is different from product branding is because of the multiple features of services. According to Moilanen, services are intangible, they are produced and consumed simultaneously. Services cannot be stored. Services are difficult to standardize. Customers participate in the production process. In general, a service product is an experience related to service consumption.
This is why brand management models do not fit well to the development of service brands. Service experience models require in-depth dedication in order to set a clear expectation and in best case be standardized to provide efficiencies.
Considering the role of marketing in service branding vs marketing physical products, there are differences. In regards to products, marketing is normally able to communicate product benefits and the organization handles production and logistics. In service business, things are different. All of the levels of the organization are involved in creating the customer experience. Unless the organization and all of its employees are aware of the company values and messages, the service experience will not fly. Therefore, in order to deliver a consistent service experience and be able to do successful marketing efforts, internal communications need to be taken care of, being a vital element in service branding success.
Friday, February 11, 2011
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Understanding customer service experience
Myer and Schwager in their Harvard Business Review article on Understanding customer experience (2007) talk about customer interactions. When core offering is a service, interactions matter more. According to Myer and Schwager touchpoints that advance customer to a subsequent and more valuable interaction (example Amazon´s 1-click ordering) matter more. In each touchpoint the gap between customer expectations and experience spells the difference between customer satisfaction and what is less.
And what makes service experience matter more? In a service experience, as a customer, you are greatly involved in the transaction. Due to the nature of your purchase (non physical good) your expectations may vary a great deal. Imagine a travel experience as an example.
I´ve earlier described my experiences in online shopping. Ordering goods was a positive and pleasant experience but returning and exchanging the same goods resulted in a huge disappointment. Same company was managing various customer processes. Some worked while others not. Result was my dissatisfaction and their loss.
In service environments, fundamental is service design - how you plan customer experience from first contact point to the last.
Planning service experience can be done understanding the customer opinion of the company throughout various touchpoints, rather just having customer data on the purchase history (mostly available through CRM approaches). Therefore planning a full scale customer experience is an extended step to managing customer relationship. In practice this could mean focus on customer needs and not fearing to analyze customer opinions; what it reveals and what are the actions to be developed.
In order to implement customer experience management process, companies could extend their evaluation of past patterns (eg surveys) to observation and face to face interviews in order to understand also present or potential future patterns.
And what makes service experience matter more? In a service experience, as a customer, you are greatly involved in the transaction. Due to the nature of your purchase (non physical good) your expectations may vary a great deal. Imagine a travel experience as an example.
I´ve earlier described my experiences in online shopping. Ordering goods was a positive and pleasant experience but returning and exchanging the same goods resulted in a huge disappointment. Same company was managing various customer processes. Some worked while others not. Result was my dissatisfaction and their loss.
In service environments, fundamental is service design - how you plan customer experience from first contact point to the last.
Planning service experience can be done understanding the customer opinion of the company throughout various touchpoints, rather just having customer data on the purchase history (mostly available through CRM approaches). Therefore planning a full scale customer experience is an extended step to managing customer relationship. In practice this could mean focus on customer needs and not fearing to analyze customer opinions; what it reveals and what are the actions to be developed.
In order to implement customer experience management process, companies could extend their evaluation of past patterns (eg surveys) to observation and face to face interviews in order to understand also present or potential future patterns.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Service availability
In some industries, service availability is one of the key success factors of companies. Providing service to customes when and where they need it is crucial.
In Helsinki, there is an ongoing project called "snow fight". Snow fight is a crisis initiative by the city of Helsinki to clean the streets of snow. There are few places where to place snow, there are problems ploughing the snow due to parked cars. Overall there are 2.600 km of streets to plough and there is a question of availability of snow ploughing equipment and personnel. It is difficult to keep their number optimal since we haven´t had this much snow this time of the year in several decades.
I was trying to find snow ploughers myself. It seems the availability of snow services is scarce or I´m simply asking at the wrong time. It´s the high season of snow. In my neighbourhood my household is the only one who would like to pay for snow ploughing service. The experience from previous services is bad. Therefore people rather do it themselves. Nobody was just able to predict the scope of this work few years back. Last winter was horrible. I was out snowploughing even four times a day. This winter I`ve already had enough. I sprained my back. I was out last night. I was out this morning. I will go again since snow just keeps coming.
The companies I called were not interested in just one flat out of many. Too long trip or too small job. Some contact people were just not interested in ploughing snow. They had other jobs more attractive and were busy with those. Service availability is scarce and we´ve not even discussed about price yet. If somebody invented a company where you could call ad hoc? No news, those companies exist already and still no progress. Which online application would integrate people who could do the job vs those who need the service now.
In Helsinki, there is an ongoing project called "snow fight". Snow fight is a crisis initiative by the city of Helsinki to clean the streets of snow. There are few places where to place snow, there are problems ploughing the snow due to parked cars. Overall there are 2.600 km of streets to plough and there is a question of availability of snow ploughing equipment and personnel. It is difficult to keep their number optimal since we haven´t had this much snow this time of the year in several decades.
I was trying to find snow ploughers myself. It seems the availability of snow services is scarce or I´m simply asking at the wrong time. It´s the high season of snow. In my neighbourhood my household is the only one who would like to pay for snow ploughing service. The experience from previous services is bad. Therefore people rather do it themselves. Nobody was just able to predict the scope of this work few years back. Last winter was horrible. I was out snowploughing even four times a day. This winter I`ve already had enough. I sprained my back. I was out last night. I was out this morning. I will go again since snow just keeps coming.
The companies I called were not interested in just one flat out of many. Too long trip or too small job. Some contact people were just not interested in ploughing snow. They had other jobs more attractive and were busy with those. Service availability is scarce and we´ve not even discussed about price yet. If somebody invented a company where you could call ad hoc? No news, those companies exist already and still no progress. Which online application would integrate people who could do the job vs those who need the service now.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Services of the church
At our recent eMBA class, we had a discussion on a very current topic; religions and the role of the Finnish church.
Basically the common view was that the Finnish evangelic lutheran church is old fashioned and has no clear strategy.
What was missed was a clear positioning; a view on how church really sees homosexuality and women in church and how they want to serve their members. The discussion of gay people has been refreshing, for the church to really clarify who is their target audience what what purposes they serve. They´ve never had any yt-neuvottelu (cooperation negotiations) to bring focus and efficiency.
We invented a new service concept for church at christmas. Instead of packing to a crowded church, why not have a short outdoor ceremony with a few songs, punch, having people go out for a walk but having an easy-to-use religious service.
We also discussed whether religion should be part of education in schools and if they should organize christmas parties. Votes were for and against. I know, christmas parties are nice, but it´s a celebration of the birth of Jesus. Is the role of schools to celebrate religious events? Instead, should or could schools celebrate the end of a school term and find another program for that? Why would schools portray religious agenda if they not have a political agenda? If one role of religion is to educate ethics and behaviour, would there not be other ways of doing this eg philosophy?
I still belong to church. My main reasoning is the goodwill done for less fortunate. But I, too, start questioning the role it could provide taken the opportunities from today´s needs of emotional and physical wellbeing.
Basically the common view was that the Finnish evangelic lutheran church is old fashioned and has no clear strategy.
What was missed was a clear positioning; a view on how church really sees homosexuality and women in church and how they want to serve their members. The discussion of gay people has been refreshing, for the church to really clarify who is their target audience what what purposes they serve. They´ve never had any yt-neuvottelu (cooperation negotiations) to bring focus and efficiency.
We invented a new service concept for church at christmas. Instead of packing to a crowded church, why not have a short outdoor ceremony with a few songs, punch, having people go out for a walk but having an easy-to-use religious service.
We also discussed whether religion should be part of education in schools and if they should organize christmas parties. Votes were for and against. I know, christmas parties are nice, but it´s a celebration of the birth of Jesus. Is the role of schools to celebrate religious events? Instead, should or could schools celebrate the end of a school term and find another program for that? Why would schools portray religious agenda if they not have a political agenda? If one role of religion is to educate ethics and behaviour, would there not be other ways of doing this eg philosophy?
I still belong to church. My main reasoning is the goodwill done for less fortunate. But I, too, start questioning the role it could provide taken the opportunities from today´s needs of emotional and physical wellbeing.
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Branded generosity
Trendwatching.com published its list of key consumer trends for 2011. On the same list you could spot two very human elements: random acts of kindness, consumers craving for kindness and being surprised in a positive way and emerging genorisity, giving, donating, sharing and sympathizing vs just selling and taking.
In other words, brands are expected to act humble, personal, showing compassion and understanding customers daily challenges. This is nothing new. But my guess is that the deeds expected from companies will no longer be big bursts of sponsorships and donations but they can be small things, generating daily goodwill. They do not need to be just donations but simple gentlemanlike acts towards customers.
Personal experiences from service economy. For the first time in my life I ordered two dresses from two different online stores. The other one was more expensive. Dress was sent as promised and was ok. The other dress was sent also as promised. With the dress came a small branded bag and the dress was on a hanger. I was so surprised.
I guess best branded deeds will be notes and messages from companies in unexpected moments. Monthly newsletters are nowdays normal. But what about personalized messages. Those that you get on birthdays and on special occasions, personalized to your orders and needs. Most companies admire Amazon for being able to track persons purchasing history and being able to make recommendations for customers´s interests. How could you do the same in industrial engineering?
Finnish brand committee´s report for branding Finland was showing similar kinds of elements of showing generosity. The committee proposed various missions for Finns for keeping up and building Finnish brand. One mission was for school children to talk to more quiet classmates. What could be my company´s small deed to providing better happiness to our customers?
In other words, brands are expected to act humble, personal, showing compassion and understanding customers daily challenges. This is nothing new. But my guess is that the deeds expected from companies will no longer be big bursts of sponsorships and donations but they can be small things, generating daily goodwill. They do not need to be just donations but simple gentlemanlike acts towards customers.
Personal experiences from service economy. For the first time in my life I ordered two dresses from two different online stores. The other one was more expensive. Dress was sent as promised and was ok. The other dress was sent also as promised. With the dress came a small branded bag and the dress was on a hanger. I was so surprised.
I guess best branded deeds will be notes and messages from companies in unexpected moments. Monthly newsletters are nowdays normal. But what about personalized messages. Those that you get on birthdays and on special occasions, personalized to your orders and needs. Most companies admire Amazon for being able to track persons purchasing history and being able to make recommendations for customers´s interests. How could you do the same in industrial engineering?
Finnish brand committee´s report for branding Finland was showing similar kinds of elements of showing generosity. The committee proposed various missions for Finns for keeping up and building Finnish brand. One mission was for school children to talk to more quiet classmates. What could be my company´s small deed to providing better happiness to our customers?
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