Service Development Project Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Service Development Project - Essay Example Being able to realise the needs of the rent-a-bike, the company had decided to offer their services. The main goal of the company is to provide bikes for rent in France that will satisfy their target market and be known in the marketplace as a company that provide effective and efficient bike services. It is important that the company will consider a good value proposition to its customers if it wishes to gain a competitive advantage over its competitors and be known in the marketplace. According to Piercy (2002) describes value for a customer, not only in terms of lower prices and higher quality, but more as a perception of one service overall benefits compared to the total cost of the service. These costs not only include price, but also the time, effort, and difficulties that may arise during the whole purchase decision and post purchase evaluation. Piercy (2002) states, those customers have become more 'sophisticated' as awareness of marketing activity has increased. The expectations of the customer have increased so much that traditional marketing perspective where the customer is easily satisfied has all but disappeared. Customers now want, and expect not only the core benefits of rent-a-bike services, but also secondary benefits such as, design, reliability, brand names, and various colours. Customers also now demand what has been referred to as, the augmented service. This would include, low energy usage, extended warranties, free delivery after purchase, or interest free credit. These secondary and augmented aspects of the service, amount to the overall superior value proposition given by the company to the customer. Treacy and Wiersema (1995) had categorized the buying motives of the customers in three different types on how to mark value. These include service leadership, customer intimacy and operational excellence. In this service, the company may use the customer intimacy value proposition for its customers. In this manner, the company will try to focus on the quality of their relationships with target market and provide complete solutions as their value proposition. The marking value that the company used is "PROVIDING EFFECTIVE AND EFFICIENT SERVICE THAT WILL SATISFY OUR TARGET MARKET." In order to create value, the company will consider service testing within the area of France. Key competitors Competitor's analysis is very important when a company will be considered as a new entrant within the market place. It is essential so that the company will be able to know their competitors and the possible strategy that they may use to outgrow such competitors and know the needs of the target market. However, it can be said that these industries do not solely focus on providing rent-a-bike in a specific target market. Hence, it can be said that OYbikes can have bigger opportunity to be recognised in the marketplace. Marketing segmentation Primarily, the context of the market segmentation for this company will be the Psychographics. Psychographics includes social class, lifestyle, and personality variables (Chiagouris & Kahle, 1997). The end result of using these variables is a psychological profile of each market segment. Issues also examined the customers' loyalties, habits and self-concept.