Essay On Service Marketing Theory Case Study Analysis

Introduction

Services marketing require addressing various issues that defines them. Such aspects range from the encounters, personnel involved and the environment to design, among others. In that respect, enhancing customer experience entails addressing the issues in line with their expectations. In that view, the case demonstrates the service marketing theories application. To achieve the objective, the analysis uses a case of a patient's experience in a hospital. (Gabbott & Hogg, 1994)

Analysis

Using relevant services marketing theory to analyse and evaluate the service encounter experienced by the Hoffman family, from their first interaction with the hospital to their departure nine weeks later.

Servuction model

Seduction model is an illustration of factors that are both visible and invisible to customers in relation to how they influence the services experience.

Contact personnel

At the emergency room, Hoffman found the watchman having a casual conversation with another man and he just stood there without empathy to help him get his wife in the wheelchair but instead continued with his conversation. In addition, the porter who wheeled Hoffman`s wife to the maternity ward was very discouraging and arrogant as she openly lied to her that there was no chance for babies born such early to survive. (Shanker, 2002)
At the maternity ward, Hoffman was greeted by many smiling nurses who escorted his wife to her room. Their greetings was a clear show that they were friendly people and welcoming which could have made Hoffman to feel a bit comfortable and welcomed and that his wife was being attended to by friendly people. Also, one of the nurses pushed him aside and assured him that all would be fine unlike what the porter had told his wife. Tha was a show of concern that built his confidence on the team that would attend to his wife with high hopes for good final results. (Sekhon, Roy, Shergill & Pritchard, 2013)
At about 6:30 am; Dr. Bakers assistant entered the maternity room looking confused and which lowered their confidence in his services. Also by how ultrasound learning test and gave out his findings without self-confidence. Ha caused he customers to lack confidence in him and being Dr. Johnson’s assistance in the delivery room was no comforting o Hoffman. In addition, there were very friendly nurses at NICU encouraging them to ask questions. That was inspiring and built confident that they were qualified for what they were doing. Above that, they have good personal touch with each parent as they gave encouragement notes, birthday cards and pictures of the babies to their parents. (Lovelock & Wirtz, 2010)
At the grower room, Hoffman and his wife had a good personal touch with the nurses there as they developed a good working relationship. So, despite the low-quality services at the grower room than what they were accustomed to at the NICU, they felt they had met good people. (Verhoef, Doorn & Beckers, 2013)

Inanimate Environment

Upon their arrival at the emergency entrance, he rushed to get a wheelchair to move his wife inside only to grab a junior-sized wheelchair. So, despite the emergency situation, he had to rush back to get the right wheelchair. That was inefficient that the wheelchairs were put in a mixed up manner that one can easily get the wrong one that is a waste of valuable time. At the maternity ward, Baker`s assistant was trying to learn how to use the ultrasound equipment, and he consistently reported his findings to people around there. His sentences began with, “I think” This was a clear show that the assistance was not well experienced and not confidence with his findings, and yet he was the one left in charge in the absence of Dr. Baker. (Popli, 2015)
The fact that Hoffman had to complete a lot of forms despite them having filled them and returned them to the hospital was an indication of poor filling systems and poor accessibility of customer’s documents. This clearly means that the hospital could not be fully relied on when it comes to recovery of customers’ documents. Further, the private recovery room that was given to Hoffman`s wife was unsatisfying as it was small, and dirty while the staffs on the fourth floor were not ready to listen to theirs complaints at all. They were very irresponsive about their situation and were not even willing to help. (Sekhon, Roy, Shergill & Pritchard, 2013)
However, it was very overwhelming how the NICU quality of care was exceptional. They seemed to cover the babies with machines and tubes that they kept explaining to the parents their purposes and functions. This was a clear show of a well-equipped room with the necessary technology to help out the newly born babies. Finally, unlike the NICU, grower was a small room that could only fit four infants at a time. This usually would lead to delays for babies to be graduated from NICU to grower room due to inadequate space. The end results would also be higher hospitalization cost that it would have been. (Lovelock & Gummesson, 2004)

Other customers

The nurse who pulled Hoffman aside and informed him that herself had given birth to a premature baby a couple of years ago and the child was doing fine, she did this as an assurance to him that all would also be well with their babies too. In addition, Dr. Arthur, the neonatologist, told them that about 90% of such babies survive & out of them, 90% develops normally. This was like good news to them in that they had higher hopes for a good end results as confidence was built in them; if such high number of babies survives, then even theirs` had higher survival chances. (Popli, 2015)
The NICU team also treated each team very well by giving the parents encouragement notes, birthday cards and pictures of their babies to take home. When Hoffman and his wife realised how well they treat everyone, they must have developed a way of thinking about them, as helpful, caring and concern people. (Mortimer & Pressey, 2013)

Quality service model

Quality service model is a quality assessment theory to attest the consumers’ quality of satisfaction using the five assessment dimensions. (Black, Childers & Leslie, 2014)

Reliability

Dr. Bakers assistance kept on trying to learn how to use the ultrasound equipment and consistently reported his findings to them with sentences that began with, “I think”That was an indication that he was not well qualified and lacked confidence in himself and hence no way could he be trusted in delivering the best quality services as a doctor. Further, Dr. Arthur had explained to them that the babies would be released from the hospital if all went well within two weeks. However, the hospital could not deliver on that promise as they had to spend nine weeks in the hospital. (Lovelock & Wirtz, 2010)
At the third floor private room, when the hospital patient representative made a courtesy call, his wife expressed her concern about the low quality of services offered there and then the personnel were changed and even were moved to a larger room. It showed that their problems were well listened to and solved hence improving service provision. In addition, he charges at the hospital at the end of it all were more than $250,000. That was a high cost than expected. (Mortimer & Pressey, 2013)

Assurance

The porter who wheeled Hoffman wife to the third floor created a lot of distrust in her by telling her that no way she would bear a child at such an early stage and get to survive. Further, one of the NICU nurses commented that they were headed to the grower room that thus should not let the nurses in there to push them around The nurse told them that in order to give them confidence in asking what they wanted. (Keller, 2012)

Tangible

Hoffman`s wife fourth-floor private room was small, dingy and dirty. This room was a bad picture of the hospital for all those who had a chance to stay in it. The room was not attractive and was creating a bad image for the company. In addition, the hospital’s grower room could only fit only four infants at a time and yet at the NICU, there averaged about 12 infants who were expected to be promoted to the grower room. This is not even logically balanced, and hence the grower room was too small and would result in delayed promotion from the NICU. (Gummesson, 2002)

Empathy

The security guard that Hoffman found at the emergency entrance was an understanding person as he allowed him first to move his wife to the emergency department before coming to move his car from the position that he had parked it. Further, as Hoffman was going to his wife`s room in the third floor, he met with many smiling nurses who greeted him. This was a show that that those nurses were not only friendly but had individualised attention. (Gronroos, 1991)
The nurse who pulled him aside and told him how she bore a premature child and was doing well expressed a high level of customer understanding. Finally, one day, Hoffman and his wife arrived at the NICU room and found pink bows in the girls’ hair. That was a clear indicator that the team there had individualised caring for each and every baby in the room. (Shanker, 2002)

Responsiveness

After a while at the maternity ward, Hoffman told both doctors that despite their advices for them to stay calm, they were not installing any confidence in either of them and at that point, the senior doctor took over the ultrasound. This was an indicator that the doctor responded to their claims for the purpose of their confidence. In addition, the quality of services at the fourth floor was mixed with some nurses being good while others were slow to respond to call buttons and instead kept blaming nurses on other shift. (Mortimer & Pressey, 2013)

How the hospital management might improve service quality and satisfaction for patients in future service encounters?

Service quality theory:
Interaction quality
Employees’ attitude.
At the hospital`s emergency entrance, the security guard confronted Hoffman when he saw him exiting his car to get a wheelchair, telling him that he should not leave his car in that position. The hospital`s management should replace the security guard with a person who is polite to customers rather than an authoritative person who is not considerate. That would help the customers to feel that they have met a person who understands their situation and is considerate. (Hill, 1999)
The management should improve customers confidence by having a team of confident doctors and their assistants. I n addition, the management should ensure that the nurse's emotional attitude is of a helpful person to the customers so as the customers can have more confidence in them. This would result in customers’ loyalty. Then the management should ensure that the grower room as it is a room that cannot be left unattended to, it should have enough nurses so in that those who are allocated there can fell flexible too like nurses a located other rooms. That would ensure that there also high quality services to the customers and not a letdown room. The customers would end up feeling more comfortable in the room with high trust on services offered there. (Kotler, 1991)

Employees’ behaviour.

The management should ensure security guards are concerned about the customers and willing to help them in a respectful manner. They should also be caring persons to create a customers’ experience that they are entering a hospital with caring people. (Buttle & Burton, 2001) The management should also ensure that the laying people in n the hospital are punished or expelled from the hospital as they made the customers lose trust in the hospital in offering high-quality services. That action would ensure that there are no customers who lose their loyalty with the hospital. Finally, the recovery rooms should have attentive nurses who are also active in responding to the calls. That would ensure that the customers feel that their need is well-paid attention to. (Kharouf, Lund & Sekhon, 2014)

Employees’ expertise

The management should ensure that all the nurses handling the customers are experts on how to handle the sick person. There should be encouraging nurses and not discouraging ones. That would help the customers to tell that they are being handled by a team that wishes them well with good end results. The hospital`s management should also ensure that all the doctors’ assistants are well trained. That would create a lot of confidence in the customers and give them high hopes of having good final results. (Shen, 2014)
The doctors should show up on time failure to which there should be another equal expertise doctor to take over his/her position. It is unprofessional for doctors’ position not to be well taken care of while customers expect to get good services in the hospital. By doing so, customers would be confident that they would get quality services at all time even in the absence of one doctor. (Kotler, 1991)

Physical environment

Design.
Wheelchairs should be well arranged in a manner that one while in a rush can still be able to differentiate them easily. The grower room should also be big enough to supply the NICU promotional need. That would help the customers to feel more satisfied in that there would be no unnecessary delays from one stage to another. In addition, all the customers’ files should be kept in a design that is easy to retrieve instead of having them to refill other forms. That would add a trust on customers that their previous medication files are well kept and can be easily be retrieved when needed. (Shen, 2014)
The private room on the fourth floor was very tiny and dingy. This room made Hoffman`s wife uncomfortable, and she had to demand another room. The management should ensure that the recovery rooms for their customers are designed in an attractive way to the customers for full customer satisfaction with the quality of housing that the hospital is offering. (Shanker, 2002)
The nurse at the grower room seldom was they given time to rest unlike other nurses in the hospital. This lead to a lot of dissatisfaction as they even carried out their roles that lead to low-quality services in that room. The management should ensure that like any other nurse in the hospital, there should have a designed timetable for an equal resting time for the nurses at the grower room. This would result in their comfort at their work and would end up offering high-quality services to the customers and hence creating customers satisfaction. (Lovelock & Gummesson, 2004)

Outcome quality

Waiting time.
There should be enough space in the delivery room to ensure that there are no delays for lack of space. If there are no delays, it would very encouraging, and even customers would be willing to come back the next time. In addition, there should be a larger room for growers to avoid unnecessary delays. That would be encouraging to the customers as they would be allowed to leave the hospital on time too without delays. Further, nurses attending to customers at the private rooms should be quick to respond to the calls. It would improve the customers trust as they would get help in time without any delays. (Shen, 2014)

Tangibles

Proper furnishing could make the waiting room more attractive and comforting and hence it would be an improvement to the customers’ service provision. (Gronroos, 1991)

Valence.

Doctors should be at their places of work as per the customers’ expectations. That would ensure that the customers do not get frustrated by realising that they are been handled by fewer experienced persons that they expected. In addition, all the stages should be well supplied with all the necessities to avoid discouragement of customers who show up with high hopes only to be let down due to the low-quality services. Further, charges should be directly proportional to their services to ensure that their customers experience value. (Lovelock & Gummesson, 2004)
The insurance and other forms should be filled up by customers before are well kept in an easily accessible manner that the customers have not to refill them again. That would improve the hospitals reliability to their customers on how to handle their medical documents especially for future references. Finally, the management should check on its quality of housing so that the customers can feel comfortable at the hospital during their time of admission to ensure that they retain their customers’ loyalty. (Shanker, 2002)

Conclusion

In view of the analysis, he service encounter by the patient was a mixed experience in terms of satisfactions and disappointments. That resulted from the various aspects of service delivery ranging from encounters, design and environment. In that respect, various recommendations have been made o ensure that the hospital enhances customer's experience as a means of enhancing loyalty and service demand.

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