Select three services: one high in search attributes, one high in experience attributes, and one high in credence attributes. Specify what product characteristics make them easy or difficult for consumers to evaluate and suggest specific strategies that marketers can adopt in each case to facilitate evaluation and reduce perceived risk.

 

Develop a simple questionnaire designed to measure the key components of customer expectations (i.e., desired, adequate, and predicted service and the zone of tolerance). Conduct 10 interviews with key target customers of a service of your choice to understand the structure of their expectations. Based on your findings, develop recommendations for firms offering this service

 

Visit the facilities of two competing service firms in the same industry (e.g., banks, restaurants, or gas stations) that you believe have different approaches to service. Compare and contrast their approaches using suitable frameworks from this chapter

Develop two different customer scripts, one for a highly standardized service and one for a highly customized service. Map all key customer steps of this script across the three stages of service consumption. What are the key differences between the standardized and customized service?

Describe an unsatisfactory encounter you experienced recently with (a) a low-contact service provider via email, mail, or phone and (b) a highcontact, face-to-face service provider. What were the key drivers of your dissatisfaction with these encounters? In each instance, what could the service provider have done to improve the situation?