1. Customer Education and Service Promotion

2. How Should We Communicate What Our Service Has to Offer?
What do customers need to know about our service, its benefits, and how best to use it? (and about our company?)
What communication methods will be most effective and efficient in reaching target audiences?
What impressions can we convey through physical evidence?
How well are our organization, its capabilities, and its brand names regarded? Do we want to change our image?

3. Role of Marketing Communication in Services:
Inform
Educate
Persuade
Remind and motivate action
Maintain relationships

4. Services vs. Goods: Implications for Communication Strategy
Intangible performances
focus on process and benefits
emphasize tangible elements
e.g., servicescape, personnel
create tangible metaphors
Customer involvement in production
train customers to use self-service
teach customers about new technologies
Help manage demand levels to match capacity
Reduced communication role for intermediaries
Importance of contact personnel
requires internal communication to inform, motivate, create role models

5. Educational and Promotional Objectives for Service
Create tangible, memorable images
Build awareness, interest to stimulate trial
Teach customers what to expect, how to use service
Communicate brand’s strengths and benefits
Manage demand levels
Compare to competition and counter their claims
Provide reassurance (e.g., promote guarantees)
Recognize, reward valued customers
Reposition service relative to competition
Reduce uncertainty, risk

6. The (5 Ws) Checklist for Marketing Communications Planning
Who is our target audience?
What do we need to communicate and achieve?
How should we communicate this?
Where should we communicate this?
When do communications need to take place?

7. Service Firms as Educators
Training employees improves productivity and quality
Well-trained customers perform better in their role as co-producers

8. Why is the Educational Role Important in Services Marketing?
Helps customers make informed decisions
Explains customer role in production
Enables customers to develop desirable skills
Shapes tastes and preferences as relationship evolves
Explains changes in service processes
Minimizes “jaycustomer” behaviour

9. Teaching Tools for Service Firms
Advertising, promotion
Brochures, instruction manuals
Websites/Intranets/groupware
Phones/hotlines
Software
Videos/audiotapes
Presentations to groups vs. one-on-one coaching
issues: free vs. paid; on-site vs. remote (e.g., phone)
Other customers

10. Marketing Communications Mix
Personal
Publicity &
Instructional
Corporate
Advertising
Sales Promotion
Communications
Public Relations
Materials
Design
Press
Selling
Broadcast
Sampling
Web sites
Signage
releases/kits
Customer
Press
Interior decor
Print
Manuals
service
Coupons
conferences
Special
Training
Internet
Discounts
Brochures
Vehicles
events
Word-of-mouth
(other customers)
Video-
Outdoor
Sign-up
Sponsorship
Equipment
audiocassettes
rebates
Trade Shows,
Exhibitions
Software
Telemarketing
Direct mail
Gifts
CD-ROM
Stationery
Prize
Voice mail
Uniforms
promotions

11. Why Use Sales Promotions in Services?
Promotions are communications incentives
Good tool for small companies (variable cost)
Reduce risk, encourage trial
Appeal to price conscious consumers with coupons
Can target specific segments, offer de facto price cut
Add excitement to mundane purchases
Help to match demand and supply

12. Uses of Sales Promotion
Immediate Purchases
Increase Trial
Encourage repurchase
Increase ad effectiveness
Encourage brand switching
Uses of
Sales
Promotion
Encourage brand loyalty

13. Tools for Consumer Sales Promotion
Coupons and Rebates
Premiums
Loyalty Marketing Programs
Contests & Sweepstakes
Sampling
Popular Tools
for
Consumer Sales
Promotion

14. Implications of the Internet for Marketing Communication
Multiple possibilities for communication—text, interactive graphics, audio, video
Easier to measure advertising effectiveness on Internet—not just number of exposures but also “clickthroughs” to purchases, etc.
Monitoring of individual customer behavior on the Web raises ethical questions relating to privacy invasion
Interactive nature of Web builds rapport, facilitates “permission marketing”
Companies collaborate through reciprocal marketing—joint listings on each other’s Web sites

15. Effective Types of On-Line Sales Promotion
Free merchandise
Effective
Types of
On-Line
Sales Promotion
Sweepstakes
Free shipping
Coupons