Marketing
It has been argued that the single most important difference between products and services is the characteristic of intangibility. In fact, it has been said that intangibility is the key to determining whether or not an offering is a service or product (Zeithaml and Bitner, 1996). This characteristic has a profound effect on the marketing of services (Lovelock, 1991; Rushton and Carson, 1989). Levitt (1981) argued that special difficulties arise from this intangibility which lead to quality control problems for the producer and evaluation problems for the consumer. It is this intangibility, or lack of physical attributes, that most likely is the reason for service variability, inseparability and perishability.Besides the concept of the lack of physical attributes of the offering (outcome), there is also the concept of physical evidence of the process which needs to be taken into consideration in an evaluation of intangibility. "Physical evidence is the environment in which the service is delivered and where the firm and the customer interact; and any tangible commodities that facilitate performance or communication of the service (Zeithaml and Bitner, 1996, p. 518)". The physical evidence of the service production process can be
Adrift in numerous service classification schemes, marketers have been looking at the nature of services through the increasing fine lens of the microscope. They have lost the macroscopic view which ultimately defines the service-product difference: intangibility. Because of this, marketers are unable to define the exact nature of the problem of purchasing and producing services, and therefore seem unable to develop a standard set of guidelines and instructions on the delivery of service quality. Research findings on intangibility, risk, uncertainty and expectations show mixed conclusions. While a recent study has shown that uncertainty is negatively associated with prepurchase expectations in industrial buying situations (Paterson et al., 1997), risk management principles state that an investor's expectation for a high rate of return should increase as the probability of loss increases. The association of intangible services, uncertainty, risk and expectations is an area yet to be examined in the service literature. Understanding consumers' service quality expectations is the key to delivering service quality. While the importance of expectations has been acknowledged in previous research of service quality and customer satisfaction, there is little empirical evidence to demonstrate how expectations of quality differ between services, even though the classification of services demonstrate that differences do exist in service characteristics (Gronroos, 1982; Oliver, 1981). The original research hypothesized that most quality issues would follow the pattern where Reliability is the most important dimension of service quality to consumers for all services. However, there is no research evidence to indicate if an individual consumer considers certain service quality dimensions to be more important in some services than in others. (2) The image comes to my mind right away.
Some common words found in the essay are:
Morris Johnston, McDougall Snetsinger, Murray Schlacter, Expectations Understanding, Rushton Carson, Bebko Prokop, Zeithaml Bitner, Pre-purchase Consumers, service quality, According SERVQUAL, Assurance Empathy, service delivery, classification schemes, consumer expectations, et al, outcome service, physical evidence, quality expectations, services research, outcome service delivery, intangible services, service quality expectations, service quality service, service delivery service, product repair involve,
Approximate Word count = 1724
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)
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