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Moving communication campaigns into action |
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The role of 'process' in services marketing Here is a back issue of Marketing Booster, the email newsletter that Richard Groom writes and sends free every fortnight to subscribers. You can subscribe here or read over 60 back issues using the back issues index page. Last evening I attended a fantastic seminar on the marketing of services. The event was organised by the local branch of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (with which I am involved) and the speaker was Laurie Young. Laurie is a specialist in the marketing of services. He now leads the 300-strong marketing team for PricewaterhouseCoopers and CFR Global. Previously he produced marketing programmes for American Express, Microsoft, Hitachi, the BBC and many others. Everything Laurie said was valuable and I don't have space to mention it all here, so instead I want to pick up on just one point. Laurie looked at the differences between products and services. One of them is that when you sell a service, customers see it being built and delivered right in front of their eyes. For example, someone buying a house goes through the legal process with their solicitor and, to a great extent, sees the process that the solicitor uses. In fact, the customer is part of the process, contributing to it several times. But when we buy a product, we don't see the process. We don't see HOW they make televisions, telephones or tins of mushy peas: we just see the product. Now here's the point Laurie made that follows on from that: when the customer is so closely involved in the process, their experience of the process itself will largely determine whether they become a fan of your business or not. Sure, the outcome is vital, but so too is the process, and their experience of it. If the customers don't enjoy the process they probably won't come back. They certainly won't recommend you to other people. And for many types of service, word-of-mouth recommendation is one of the main sources of new business, Now let me bring this to a practical level by giving you an example of putting this theory into action. It's an example from my own work. When I write something for clients, I usually meet them to gather the information I need. Then I go away and write a first draft. As most copywriters will tell you, the first draft is rarely close to the finished item. I can get it badly wrong but that doesn't matter: what's important is that the first draft gives clients an opportunity to give me feedback about what is and isn't right. Once I get feedback to the first draft I can produce a second draft, which is usually much closer to the mark. It can take three to five drafts before we reach the finished version. Now here's the thing. Sometimes, even though I explain this process to clients, they get upset when they receive the first draft because it isn't what they were looking for. They get so upset that sometimes they tell the people around them that the writing I've done isn't good enough. What they should do is give me specific feedback about what they've read so that I can continue the process. So for these clients (it probably happens about 20% of the time) the PROCESS is not an enjoyable experience. In fact it's a bit of a pain for them. They are not likely to rave about me to other people, or ask me to work for them again. What Laurie helped me see is that this is something I need to get right. So I'm going to change the process. From now on, I will try to personally deliver the first draft to new clients and talk them through it there and then. That way, I'll be able to get the feedback I need and reassure clients that I will listen and come up with what they are looking for. Once I have been through this once with new clients hopefully they will understand the process better and it will get easier on subsequent projects. We won't have to have that in-person meeting but can use email and phone to exchange feedback. I'm so glad I attended this seminar because I think the change to my process is going to make things a lot simpler and more enjoyable for my clients. If you are in the service sector, how does your sales and delivery process look to your clients? In particular, what is it about the process that new clients don't understand or dislike? How can you change the process to fix those problems? Copyright 2003 Richard Groom |