Description
“Every contact we have with a customer influences whether or not they’ll come back. We have to be great every time or we’ll lose them.” – Kevin Stirtz “We must learn what customers really want, not what they say they want or what we think they should want.” – Eric Ries “Customer service is the new marketing, it’s what differentiates one business from another.” – Jay Baer We all come into contact with service operations every single day as customers or users of a wide range of commercial and public servcies. Services marketing and management is an activity that is concerned with both what we deliver and how it is delivered to customers . It involves understanding the needs of customers, managing the processes that deliver the services, ensuring the objectives are met and contiunually improving the services. As such, service marketing and management is a central organisational function and one that is critical to organisational success.
Type Subject
Optativa
Semester
Second
Credits
5.00
Previous Knowledge
Objectives

This course seeks to assist you:
1. To appreciate the importance of services marketing in the current business environment
2. To understand the issues and challenges encountered in service marketing
3. To develop the knowledge needed to implement service strategies
4. To understand the importance of customer relationships through quality services

By the end of this course, students should be able to have achieved the objectives set up for this course and have developed the competencies listed above.
Students should have the capacity to understand the importance of developing and implementing quaility service strategies and how best to market them.

Contents

The course is structured in 7 main sections:
1. Foundations for Services Marketing
2. Focus on the Customer
3. Understanding Customer Requirements
4. Aligning Service Design and Standards
5. Delivering and Performing Service
6. Managing Service Promises
7. Service and the Bottom Line.

Methodology

The methodology utilised will be a combination of theory and practise.
The theoretical component will focus on the understanding of the theoretical concepts, theories and applications applied in service marketing and management.
The practical component is developed by student active participation and collaboration during class sessions, class activities, presentations and simulations and is a major requisite for success not only on this course but for success in the world of business.

Evaluation

The Course grade will be based on the following breakdown:
20% Quality participation and involvement in class activities
30% Portfolio of case studies– set over 5 weeks from 9th February until the midterms. The grade for the portfolios will become the midterm grade. This is an individual grade
50% Final Practical based assessment – set around the midterm and ongoing until final exam week when the final presentation will be made. This is a group grade

Retake Policy: As this course is based on practical experiential learning, there is no re-take for the practical component and students failing that part will be required to re-take another project during the summer vacation. For the portfolio another selection of cases will be set for completion with a maximum grade of 5 obtainable.

Evaluation Criteria
Basic Bibliography

In addition to the cases we will be discussing in class, you will be expected to keep up to date with current publications in the field through access to the library intranet and social media.

There is no Required Textbook but I suggest these 2 books for additional reading:
Zeithaml, A, Bitner, M et al (2017) Services Marketing: Integrating Focus Across the Firm. McGraw Hill International Edition
Wirtz, J, Lovelock, S and Chew, P (2017) Essentials of Services Marketing. Pearson

Additional Material