3006MKT Service Design and Standard Report
Background Information
In this report, you will need to conduct a marketing audit on a service company of your choice. Marketing audit is a systematic investigation of a company’s current marketing activities with a view to identifying problem areas and recommending a plan of improvement. The company should offer service products which are service dominant rather than goods dominant, for example, local mover, travel agent, gym, hotel, hairdresser rather than a supermarket, café or restaurant. In addition, you are not allowed to choose an airline company because we will use it for class activities to illustrate various sections of this report.
Understanding the Customer, Competitor, and Company or the analysis of 3 Cs (see chapter 3) will provide a good direction for the marketing audit. After the analysis of the 3Cs, your team will then examine three areas of current services marketing activities (i.e., service blueprint, physical evidence, customer service) and provide recommendations to make an improvement on the current strategy. The recommendations should offer a strategic fit for the company. You are only required to conduct secondary research (using public available data) for this assignment.
Some companies are large and offer a portfolio of services; therefore students should narrow their scope in the report and state the scope they are analysing (e.g., Telstra prepaid Mobile). The service company should be one which you can easily get information on, for example, media, website, or which you have previously worked in or have experiences as a consumer of the service.
Submission
1. Service company/organisation profile (see Learning@Griffith)
Due Date: No later than week 5, please submit a hardcopy to your tutor.
Notes: Your tutor will decide if the chosen company is appropriate for the assignment. The decision will be informed to you in the following workshop.
2. Service design and standard report
Due Date: Week 9, Thursday 12/Sep/19 at 23.59
Submission: Students are only required to submit the assignment via SafeAssign on Learning@Griffith.
Weighting & Words limit
This assignment is worth 40% of the total marks and has 2500 words limit excluding executive summary, references and appendices. A penalty mark applies, if your report contains over 2,750 words.
Other Requirements
1. Cover page: include the following information: 1) tutor’s name, 2) Workshop date & time, 3) Name and student ID, and 4) company name
2. Format: 12-point Times New Roman font and double-spaced.
3. APA style for citing and referencing
4. Tables, Diagrams and Figures should be included in the main section.
5. Only supplementary material may be contained in appendix.
Report Structure
Executive Summary
Provide a brief overview (maximum 1 page) of the report. The executive summary should be succinct and should cover the key points of the report.
Analysis of Customer, Competitor, and Company (3Cs)
- Company analysis: Provide some background information on the service company including current positioning and reputation/brand image. Analyse and discuss key strengths and weaknesses of the company.
- Customer analysis: Briefly define and profile the main markets of the company (including market segments and target market). Analyse market attractiveness and customer needs. Identify consumer trend.
Discuss the overall opportunities and threats based on the analysis of customer and competitor.
- Competitor analysis: Identify the current positioning of the competitors and your company using a positioning map (comparing your company against key competitors). Analyse and discuss key strengths and weaknesses of key competitors.
(see Chapter 3 for more details on 3 Cs analysis)
Analysis of Service Blueprint
In this part, you will need to draw service blueprint (see seminar activity).
Evaluate the current process: Identify the potential fail points during the process, for example, waiting time.
Analysis of Customer Service Strategy
This part may include the standard at service encounters, an interaction between service employees and customers, and overall service quality.
Evaluate the strategy: Identify potential problems with the current strategy. For example, a customer made a complaint on TripAdvisor about a frontline employee who was very rude and slow.
Analysis of Physical Evidence (Servicescape)
Analyse the current physical evidence strategy: This may include cleanliness, the comforts of waiting area.
Evaluate the strategy: Identify potential problems with the current strategy. For example, the waiting area is clean and tidy only in the Morning but becomes very untidy in the afternoon.
Recommendations
In this part, you will propose a solution to each problem that you have identified in the previous sections. You will need to discuss why the proposed solution is appropriate. Good solutions should be practical and based on the analysis of company, customer and competitor. Do not suggest a major infrastructure change which may require a million of dollar investment. You also need to identify and discuss the most urgent problem facing the company to make an immediate change/improvement.
References
A minimum of 8 references is required for the report. Students should use APA referencing format to reference all sources of information such as textbooks, journal articles, websites (e.g. Australian Bureau of statistics or news websites) and business periodicals (e.g. Forbes, Australian Financial Review)
Appendices
The appendices include supplementary materials that support the analyses.