Introduction
Marketing of services is a complex knowledge domain that requires one to work on the consumer’s perception of the service. One example is the concept of employee emotional labor, according to which the way the employees display emotions during interactions impacts customer satisfaction. Other examples include the company’s webpage or its physical environment, all of which affect the intentions and behaviors of the consumers. This report aims to summarise the findings of research articles on service marketing.
People
The workers’ performance affects customer experience and by boosting employees’ work satisfaction managers can impact the quality of their services. Hur, Moore, and Jung (2015) discuss the issue of emotional labor and the connection between employees’ emotional labor and customers’ response. Previous studies show that emotional labor and emotional regulation of the employees, such as smiling when interacting with costumes and assertiveness, have a good impact on the perceived quality of services. These findings are the reason why most organizations encourage their employees to display positive emotions when interacting with customers (Hur, Moore, and Jung, 2015). The customers judge the quality of service partially based on their experiences while interacting with the employees.
Some factors can intervene and impact the interactions between a consumer and service provider, mitigating or enhancing the effect of emotional labor. Notably, ‘customer–employee rapport mediates the relationship” between employee’s smiling and customer’s satisfaction with the services (Hur, Moore and Jung, 2015, p. 71). Among the many factors, this study points out employee job satisfaction as a significant contributor to the mediation of the interactions. The premise is that job satisfaction acts as an emotional contamination factor. Moreover, Hur, Moore, and Jung (2015) argue that employees can use different strategies of displaying emotions, for example, surface acting, which is a display of fake emotions, such as faking a smile, and deep acting, which are the true emotions of an employee. However, suffrage acting does not affect the customer’s perception of the services negatively. Therefore, this article shows the complexity of the relationship between a consumer and an employee providing services, and the authors suggest that customer satisfaction can be affected by employee job satisfaction, which mediates the effect of surface acting and job satisfaction.
When interacting with customers, employees need to show positive emotions. For example, I am very sensitive to the atmosphere in restaurants, and if waiters do not welcome me and show a positive attitude, I feel unwelcome and less satisfied with the experience. One time, I came to have dinner with my parents at a local restaurant, and our waiter was a trainee. He was very welcoming and appeared to display genuine emotions, such as smiling. Sadly, he spilled soup on me while putting the plate on the table, which was a dissatisfying experience. However, looking back, I do not have many negative emotions about this incident or the restaurant in general, and I attribute this to the behavior and emotional labor of the waiter.
This experience is consistent with the literature findings since the emotional labor of employees has a major impact on the way customers perceive a service. Heim (2020, p. 15) argues that the emotional labor of hotel employees, in their perception, shapes their work environment and it becomes a ‘tool that enables employees to stimulate positive work- and service environments through social interaction.’ Hence, in the described case, the trainee waiter created a positive environment when interacting with me, which mediated the effect of his mistake. Moreover, Gera, Arora, and Malik (2020) argue that employees in the hospitality and tourism industries are expected to display friendliness and friendliness. Hence, I understand that I have certain expectations when going to restaurants or visiting hotels, I expect the employees o be welcoming, and if they are not, my perception of the services is more negative.
Process
The domain of online web pages is becoming more important for businesses since consumers now look for information online and even order services through pages on the web. Bilgihan, Kandampully, and Zhang (2016) explore what makes a cohesive online experience, by examining the different elements such as design, usability, easiness to find, and others. Belgian, Kandampully and Zhang (2016, p. 102) conclude that ‘easiness to locate the Web site/app, ease of use, perceived usefulness, hedonic and utilitarian features, perceived enjoyment, personalization, social interactions, and multi-device compatibility are the antecedents’ are the main elements that help create a unified customer experience. Hence, when working on a web page, one must not merely create a website and fill it with content but also ensure that the other elements will contribute to the satisfaction of potential users.
In my experience, having useful information and features such as ordering a service online on the webpage are the crucial elements of customer experience. For example, when I was looking for a car dry cleaning service in my city, I understood that not many drycleaners provide the necessary information, such as the suitability of drycleaning for specific fabrics, the final price. But most importantly, only one website allowed to make an appointment online while others only provided a phone number. Hence, I choose a dry cleaning service that allowed making an appointment online because it was easier and required less time, which contributed to my overall perception of this service.
The literature suggests that web pages should be tailored towards the needs of the customers because otherwise, they are more likely to choose a competitor’s service. Zhou and Guan (2020), for example, argue that the experience that consumers have with a website affects their purchasing intentions. Moreover, the appearance and functionality of a website impact the satisfaction of consumers with the experience. Thus, it is essential to ensure that not only the quality of the service is excellent, but the presentation of it on the company’s website is good as well.
Physical Evidence
Servicescapes are the physical environments where the services are provided to the customers, and they affect the experience of the customers. Lin (2016) discusses visual aesthetics as an element of customer experience and suggests that these factors impact how the consumers perceive a service, using the example of a hotel lobby. The researcher examines the relationship between ‘visual servicescape aesthetics comprehension and appreciation (VSACA) and perceived perceptual experience quality (PPEQ)’ (Lin, 2016, p. 692). VSACA affects consumers’ PPEQ, satisfaction, and desire to pay more. Based on the conclusions, one can argue that the visual presentation of the environment where the service is being provided affects the customer’s mood and their attitudes towards the service and its cost.
I experienced the importance of visual aesthetics when servicing my car at the dealership, and understood that both my experience and understanding of why I paid more for the service were affected by the aesthetics. When I got my first car, I went to service it at the official dealership, even though it was old and I knew I could do it at any other station, and it would be cheaper. But I wanted to make sure that everything was checked. Upon arrival, I was pleasantly surprised by the setup and the interior of the service center, it was bright, and everything was in white and red. Moreover, there was an area specifically for car owners, with coaches and chairs, where one could drink coffee, eat snacks and watch the car being repaired through a giant window facing the servicing area. Even though I paid a lot for servicing, I enjoyed watching my car being repaired and did not regret visiting the official dealership. I would argue that the visual aesthetics of this place, in comparison to non-official car repair shops is what convinced me that it was worth paying more.
The literature on the topic suggests that visual aesthetics indeed play an important role in consumers’ decision-making. Chien et al. (2016, p. 162) argue that ‘visual aesthetics is a critical factor of new product design to capture customer attention and create a positive emotional reaction.’ This claim suggests that visual aesthetics are becoming integral for a high-quality service because it affects the overall perception that a consumer gets. Moreover, Nia and Shokouhyar (2020) found that better visual aesthetics of web pages affect the perceived quality of the products affecting customers’ trust desire to purchase or revisit the page. Hence, visual aesthetics play a role both for online and offline services and impact the consumers’ experiences.
Conclusion
Overall, this paper explored the experience of customers using services using the three P. From the perspective of people, the surface or deep emotional labor of employees impacts customer satisfaction (Heim, 2020). The usability of a webpage may affect the decision of a consumer to use the services, from the viewpoint of processes (Zhou and Guan, 2020). Finally, the physical environment and its visual aesthetics impact the experience and willingness of people to pay more for service (Nia and Shokouhyar, 2020). These comments help create a wholesome service marketing strategy by providing consumers with what they expect to receive as excellent service.
Reference List
Bilgihan, A., Kandampully, J. and Zhang, T. (2016) ‘Towards a unified customer experience in online shopping environments: antecedents and outcomes’, International Journal of Quality and Service Sciences, 8(1), pp. 102-119.
Chien, C.-F., et al. (2016) ‘Data-driven innovation to capture user-experience product design: An empirical study for notebook visual aesthetics design’, Computers & Industrial Engineering, 99, pp. 162-173.
Gera, R., Arora, S. and Malik, S. (2020) ‘Emotional labor in the tourism industry: strategies, antecedents, and outcomes’ in Costa, V. G. and do Rosário Mira, M. (eds.) Handbook of research on human capital and people management in the tourism industry. London: IGI Global, pp. 73-91.
Heim, L. (2020) Emotional labor in the workplace. Sustaining smile vs. sustainable smile: a case study from Denmark. Mater’s thesis. Lund University.
Hur, W.-M., Moon, T.-W. and Jung, Y.S. (2015) ‘Customer response to employee emotional labor: the structural relationship between emotional labor, job satisfaction, and customer satisfaction’, Journal of Services Marketing, 29(1), pp. 71-80.
Lin, I. Y. (2016) ‘Effects of visual servicescape aesthetics comprehension and appreciation on consumer experience’, Journal of Services Marketing, 30(1), pp. 692-712.
Nia, M. R. and Shokouhyar, S. (2020) ‘Analyzing the effects of visual aesthetic of web pages on users’ responses in online retailing using the VisAWI method’, Journal of Reearch in Interactive Marketing, 14(4), pp. 357-389.
Zhou, J. and Guan, H. (2020) ‘Research on the impact of new retail consumer experience on purchase behavior’, DEStech Transactions on Social Science Education and Human Science, Lancaster, UK, September. Web.