Customer Satisfaction and the Services Marketing Mix
Rama Yelkur

ABSTRACT. As the U.S. economy continues to shift from a manufacturing to a service orientation, it is important for marketers to understand the importance of reactively adapting to customers through the marketing concept. This manuscript deals with one aspect of that adaptive process: customer service satisfaction. The purpose of this paper is to develop a model (see Figure 1) that suggests the possible effect of each individual element of the services marketing mix on the customer’s perception of the service. The customer experiences the service through the marketing mix; the critical elements in the services marketing mix that influence customer expectations being place, physical evidence, participants, and process. The customer’s experience of the service, the feelings and perceptions, have a pervasive influence on attracting new customers and retaining existing customers. The proposed model is formulated on the basis of propositions that relate marketing mix variables to the customer’s perception of service. The model incorporates customer expectations derived from his or her own experience or others’ experiences with the service, the service price relative to the price of other identical services, and the organization’s promotional methods for communicating the features of the service offered. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-342-9678. E-mail address: Website: ]

INTRODUCTION The intangible nature of services induces customers to seek surrogate measures of quality. The appearance of facilities and service delivery personRama Yelkur is affiliated with the Department of Management & Marketing, College of Business, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, Eau Claire, WI 54702-4004. Journal of Professional Services Marketing, Vol. 21(1) 2000 E