A study on the promotional mix of pre-service in the view of service design
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/IMDS-08-2018-0331 |
| Published date | 09 September 2019 |
| Pages | 1669-1690 |
| Date | 09 September 2019 |
| Author | Chenxiang Qian,Chih-Fu Wu,Zhenbo Zhang,Hsin-Yu Huang |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management |
A study on the promotional
mix of pre-service in the view
of service design
Chenxiang Qian
Art College of Xiamen University, Xiamen University, Xiamen, China and
The Graduate Institute of Design Science, Tatung University, Taipei, Taiwan
Chih-Fu Wu
Department of Industrial Design, Tatung University, Taipei, Taiwan
Zhenbo Zhang
The Graduate Institute of Design Science, Tatung University, Taipei, Taiwan and
School of Arts and Textile and Clothing Engineering,
Changshu Institute of Technology, Changshu, China, and
Hsin-Yu Huang
Department of Industrial Design, Tatung University, Taipei, Taiwan
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to explore current marketing communication mixes (MCMs) in two
industries, electronics home appliance stores ( face-to-face interaction) and remote care (interface-mediated
interaction), to propose marketing strategies from the perspective of service design and determine the
relationships between service interaction patterns and MCMs in the pre-service phase.
Design/methodology/approach –Six industry experts in marketing were interviewed through
semi-structured interviews, the topic of which focused on the details of five MCMs and their correlations
were analyzed using a customer journey maps. Finally, the MCMs were further explored to verify differences
in attractiveness to customers, respectively.
Findings –The result showed that the most attractive activity for the electronics home appliance stores
customer is the promotion. And the four face-to-face service interaction patterns and MCMs exhibited a low
correlation. In addition, the customers of remote care service argued that the personnel selling was the most
attractive MCMs to them. For customers who utilize smart devices to communicate with advertisement
exhibited the highest correlation coefficient.
Research limitations/implications –The limitation of this study is that the research only conducts
interview research on two service industries.
Practical implications –This study was expected to develop improved marketing communication
strategies to remedy the sales predicament induced by virtual channels and to increase people’s acceptance of
remote care service.
Originality/value –The value of this paper is to analyze the correlation and difference of MCMs and service
interaction patterns between electronics home appliance stores and remote care, and propose a structural
model of MCMs for two different industries.
Keywords Service design, Marketing communication mix, Service interaction pattern,
Promotional advertisement, Pre-service phase
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
With the development of e-commerce and artificial intelligent, many related industries are
searching for breakthroughs and transformations, which lead to a discussion of their
marketing communication mixes (MCMs) and service interaction patterns. Service is a
dynamic process that occurs throughout a certain period. Every service follows the stages of
preservice, service and post service (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2011). The most crucial topic
in service design at present should be the value and nature of interactions between people
Industrial Management & Data
Systems
Vol. 119 No. 8, 2019
pp. 1669-1690
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0263-5577
DOI 10.1108/IMDS-08-2018-0331
Received 2 August 2018
Revised 5 September 2018
18 October 2018
16 March 2019
24 June 2019
Accepted 30 June 2019
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0263-5577.htm
1669
A study on the
promotional
mix of
pre-service
and people, people and products, people and systems, and systems and other systems
(Stickdorn et al., 2011). Conventional industries, such as electronic home appliance stores,
emphasize the relationship among people, products and the environment. Emerging service
industries, such as remote care, focus on tangible environments and intangible systems. The
advancement of technology has affected the services of these two industries to varying
degrees, generating new changes that might concern pre-service communication strategies
and interaction methods, both of which often affect subsequent service. In the pre-service
phase, marketing communications are the first contact consumers have with a service.
Pre-service touchpoints arouse consumer expectations toward a particular service or
product regardless of whether these touchpoints involve direct contact between consumers
and service personnel. Reviews indicate that these touchpoints contain all relevant
marketing communication or indirect contacts (Stickdorn and Zehrer, 2009). Therefore, this
study targeted two industries, electronic home appliance stores, an industry with which
customers are familiar, and remote care, an emerging industry with which they are
unfamiliar, to investigate the use of MCMs and service interaction patterns to move the
focus on customers from preservice to service.
As vendors of tangible goods, conventional electronic home appliance stores are a typical
example of an industry whereby many firms apply goods-dominant logic (G-D logic).
Tangible goods belong to operand resources, whose value is determined by producers, and
customers are the recipients of goods. G-D logic centers on production and delivery of value,
that is, value in exchange (Vargo and Lusch, 2004). Long-established conventional electronic
home appliance stores have formed a series of MCMs. However, the development of
e-commerce and the emergence of virtual channels have threatened and challenged the
status of conventional electronic home appliance stores. Therefore, they urgently require
breakthroughs and transformations, with switching to service-dominant logic (S-D logic)
being one significant method. Mager and Sung (2011) indicated that service design should
emphasize comprehensive customer perceptions, namely, the experiences of customers
before, during and after service. Considering that conventional electronic home appliance
stores concentrate primarily on the phase of service delivery, they should improve their
MCMs for pre-service experiences when transitioning to S-D logic marketing.
The operation of the medical industry is based on S-D logic. This industry provides
intangible products (i.e. services) whose value is perceived and determined by customers.
Therefore, customers are conceived as co-producers, and product value is generated during
customers’use of products, that is, value in use (Vargo and Lusch, 2004). With the recent
development of artificial intelligence, numerous developed countries have been using smart
health care as a touchpoint to pursue innovation in the medical industry. With the increase
in health awareness, preventive health care has gained attention. As a part of preventive
health care, remote care is at the forefront of smart health care development. However,
remote care is an emerging industry based on technological interventions, and the general
public has little understanding of it. As a result, people have a lower level of acceptance of
this industry, posing difficulty for promotional marketing. Remote care is currently
promoted through bundling with insurance or security; this hinders the development of the
industry in the long run. Service design is considered a type of experience design method
that allows customers to perceive the value of the entire service process through various
touchpoints (Ho and Sung, 2014). Because remote care is an emerging industry, multiple new
touchpoints may form during its development, but these remain unknown to researchers.
Thus, the objective of this study was to investigate the use of MCMs and service interaction
patterns to reverse the current situation, which is currently unfavorable for remote care
service promotion.
Although marketing has long been established, it remains considered themost applicable
academic discipline to service design (Kimbell, 2011). Service contact and adequate MCM
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