Business Marriage: Quality & Franchise

By Sarala Liyanage – University of Colombo – Management


 

Pizza Hut could be identified as another company that is highly focusing on the quality of the services they provide in order to have a set of delighted customers. They believe that employees (people of an organization) interfacing with customers have a massive impact on the customer satisfaction levels as well. From the customers’ point of view, staffs are generally inseparable from the total service provided: therefore quality of the services delivery matters. 

As soon as a customer steps in to Pizza hut one of their team members’ greet the customer warmly and directs him to a table and offers the menu card. 

They assure that their trusted, experienced staff has the required skill of performing the task given to them; mainly when dealing with customers also with the trusted global brand name ‘Pizza Hut’. Pizza Hut also ensures reliability to the customers by delivering a promised punctual service. They have a specific time slot (Fifteen Minutes) to deliver the ordered product to the customer according to the customer specification. The tangibles they own such as appearances of physical facilities, equipments, personnel and material have been able to contribute to this aspect largely. Pizza hut have developed this through the atmosphere of the outlet, and the layout plan, which is rather done in an attractive manner. In addition to it their staffs are dressed up with identical uniforms which is rather easy for the customers to trace them at once. 

Also through their set menus and personalized services they have been able to provide adequate information about their product range since modern customers would always seek for individual attention and customized services.

My personal experience in the case of Pizza Hut, is that on one Sunday when my friends came over I ordered a regular chicken pizza over the phone, whereas they delivered me sausage crust pizza, which disturbed me a lot; eventually ended up myself visiting the outlet and complaining to the manager in charge. He was very helpful where he responded fast and replaced me with a large chicken pizza free of charge. Scenarios such as this emphasize the importance of responsiveness to customer grievances and also empathy which runs deep in the extent of caring for the customer, understanding him and building long term relationships.Therefore tracking customer expectations that change over time brings in a great advantage to the service providers to succeed long term. 

Throughout the variances of these services offering, an organization will have a base of dissatisfied, indifferent and delighted customers. Having a set of a delighted customer base is critical for a company to succeed long term. In the case of Sri Lankan Airlines the more pleasant episodes you have (the more you travel) increase is to be seen in the cumulative satisfaction levels, enhancing positive word of mouth, and loyalty promotion and repeat purchases. It also brings in a competitive advantage to the company.

To sustain long term loyalty, additionally, companies develop different strategies. For example Arpico Supermarkets’ a retail group around the city issues a privilege card to their consumers that buys over five thousand rupees. By presenting the card, the purchaser is typically entitled to either a discount on the current purchase, or an allotment of points that can be used for future purchases. It would be a powerful mode of achieving customer loyalty and retention long term. Additionally commitment of customers would increase, making them more forgiving which will be rather beneficial in handling service recovery and complaint management processes. 

Heading towards a satisfactory service climate

The effectiveness in the processes involved in service delivery also determines satisfaction levels of customers. Evaluations could be done by assessing whether, the customers have to queue or wait to be dealt with, how customers are kept informed and whether the service is conducted efficiently.

There are plenty of examples of organizations that have effectively marketed their services, sometimes even globally with huge success (e.g. McDonalds & Pizza Hut). For other service organizations such as Not for profit organizations (e.g. Red Cross) including charities, hospitals and political parties services marketing has been embraced with varying degree of success. Additionally the aspects discussed in the article are of great importance to upcoming entrepreneurs to succeed in their business ventures.