ROLE OF SERVICE QUALITY IN BUILDING BRAND EQUITY

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1 ROLE OF SERVICE QUALITY IN BUILDING BRAND EQUITY TRILOK PRATAP SINGH Research Scholar, Department of Management, Jiwaji University, Gwalior, India ABSTRACT In the present quality is an important element in every aspects, quality is seen as a major factor in customer acquisition and retention. It is generally believed that Quality dilutes brand image. At the same time, Quality can also contribute to brand image building as it is useful to create positive effects on the brand knowledge structure. This study throws light upon finding out the dilution of the service attributes helps in forming brand and the differential perception between assurance and responsiveness. The objectives of the study are to examine the effect of service quality on the perception of brand attributes and also to examine the differential effect if any, of assurance and responsiveness on the perception of the brand image. The study is based on the primary data collected through survey method by employing questionnaire. The survey was conducted on a homogeneous sample consisting of the faculty members from various colleges of the North India. A quasiexperimental method was used for the survey. Introduction As marketing concept evolved, companies have started giving priority to achieve highest customer satisfaction; companies make sure they deliver best quality product or services. Quality can be defined as the collective effect of service performances which determine the degree of satisfaction of a user of the service.. Customer and producer of service have different perception about service quality of service consumed and produced. Quality is excellence, quality is value, quality is conformance to specifications, and quality is meeting and/or exceeding customers expectations (Reeves and Bednar, 1994). The quality of care has three components: the goodness of technical care judged by its effectiveness, the goodness of the interpersonal relationship judged partly by its contribution to technical care, and the goodness of the amenities. Barnes (1987) emphasizes that the control of the performance of the installation, building or engineering structure should be managed in the same way as the management of time and cost. Quality is not only concise to the product quality, it also covers service arena but there is a different view for both of them. Quality is an objective measurement in manufacturing and a subjective one in the service sector. Service businesses are heterogeneous, quality is intangible, and production and consumption of the product (service) are inseparable (Susan and McDaniel, 1995).Service quality is widely accepted as a key factor in achieving competitive advantage in most service industries. Brand Image is the value endowed by the brand to the product (Farquer,1989). A set of brand assets and liabilities linked to a brand, its name and symbol that adds to or detracts from the value provided by a product or service to a firm and/or to the firm s customers. Brand image is often associated with an increased likelihood of a customer choosing a product and the willingness of a customer to pay 24 icmrrjournal@gmail.com

2 premium prices for the product. As such, brand image is a forward-looking assessment of the value of a firm s relationship with its customers. Keller (1993) also takes the customer-based brand strength approach to brand image, suggesting that brand image represents a condition in which the customer is familiar with the brand and recalls some favorable, strong and unique brand associations. Hence, there is a differential effect of brand knowledge on customer response to the marketing of a brand. Brand knowledge is defined in terms of Brand loyalty, Brand awareness, Brand image and Brand association. The customer based brand image is realized or achieved through years with the patronage of the customers and owned by the brand s customers (Aker, 1991). Researchers have found that quality is to satisfy the customer expectations. Satisfy customers rarely switch over another brand and hence quality plays a vital role in creating brand image. Literature Review:- Quality professionals define quality in number of ways but the most common view to define quality as: meeting the customer s expectations or compliance with customer s specification. After manufacturing the product and before delivering the services companies check the product and services to the required standard and then delivered to the market and that standards should be established according to the customer expectations because customer give the tag of quality product only when that product or services satisfies the level of expectation. Quality may be defined in various perspectives. Let s take different perspective one by one. The inspirational definition of quality is synonymous with innate excellence. The assumption is that quality is both absolute and universally recognizable. According to Pirsig (1992), defining quality as excellence means that it is understood ahead of definition as a direct experience independent of and prior to intellectual abstractions. This perspective to defining quality is highly subjective. In product based perspective quality comes from the right quantity of contents. Differences in quantity of some ingredient or attribute possessed by the product are considered to reflect differences in quality (Garvin, 1984). This approach is more objective since it based on measurable characteristic of the product. In user based perspective, quality is the extent to which a product or service meets or exceeds customers expectations. Juran (1951) conceptualized the quality was composed of two parts: the quality of design and the quality of conformance. In manufacturing based perspective, quality is in the roots of production and operations. Here quality is defined as conformance to specifications (Crosby, 1979). Quality of conformance means degree to which a product meets certain design standards. This perspective shows that quality is the part of engineering and manufacturing practices. In value based definition, quality means performance at an acceptable price or at an acceptable cost. This definition supports the notion that customer often consider quality in relation to price. Feigenbaum (1951) defined quality as best for certain customer conditions the conditions being the actual use and selling price of the product. Brand image has been defined in many contexts. Winters (1991) relates brand image to added value by suggesting that brand image involves the value added to a product by customers' associations and perceptions of a particular brand name. When marketing practitioners use the term brand image, 25 icmrrjournal@gmail.com

3 they tend to mean brand description or brand strength, referred to as customer brand image to distinguish it from the asset valuation meaning (Wood, 2000). The customer-based brand image definitions approach the subject from the perspective of the customer whether it is an individual or an organization. They contend that for a brand to have value it must be valued by customers. Then, the power of a brand lies in what customers have learned, felt, seen, and heard about the brand as a result of their experiences over time (Keller, 2003). If the brand has no meaning to the customer, none of the other definitions is meaningful (Keller, 1993; Cobb-Walgren and Ruble, 1995; Rio et al., 2001a). Thus, a customer-based definition of brand image is given by Keller (2003) as the differential effect that brand knowledge has on customer response to the marketing of that brand. The customer of any service wants to have the provider meet their expectations; meeting expectation builds brand image in the areas of reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empathy and tangibles. These five dimensions represent the determinants of the perception of service quality on the part of the customer. Factors Table 1: Dimensions of service quality Description Assurance Knowledge and courtesy of employees and their ability to inspire trust and confidence Responsiveness Willingness to help customers and provide prompt service Empathy Caring, individualized attention the firm provides its customers Reliability Ability to perform the promised service dependably and accurately Tangibles Condition of facilities, equipment, and appearance of personnel (Source: Pariseau S.E & McDaniel J.R, 1995) However our research is concentrated over two dimensions of service quality are assurance and responsiveness because these are the most prominent dimensions in service delivery. Objectives of the study There is a general belief that good service quality supports in transforming any service provider in to a strong brand, there would be the dilution? in brand image with customers. The brand image of the brand depends essentially on the brand attributes. Similarly service quality would be measure in various service dimensions (see in Table 1). The study envisages finding out the dilution of the service quality attributes in forming brand and differential perception between various dimensions of service quality. The objectives of the study are: To examine the effect of service quality on the perception of brand image. To examine the differential effect if any, of assurance and responsiveness on the perception of the brand image. Hypotheses of the Study H01= Quality is not likely to influence the perception of the customer based brand image. H02= Assurance as service quality dimension is not likely to have differential effect on brand attribute perception when compared with responsiveness icmrrjournal@gmail.com

4 Methodology The study was based on the primary data. The primary data was derived through survey method employing questionnaire. The actual questionnaire was prepared after a pilot study among one customer group namely faculty members from various colleges of North India. The questions were related to banking services, as it is one of the widely and frequently used services. Data was collected from 81 respondents out of which 64 males and 17 females. The sample was homogeneous in nature. The respondents were of same profession, highly educated and belonging to the same geographical area. Out of 81 respondents, 40 were given questions pertaining to assurance and the rest 41 pertaining to responsiveness. The methodology adopted was quasi-experimental method. In this experiment, the respondents were selected through convenient sampling method to maintain the demographic homogeneity. The questionnaire consists of three sections A, B and C. The A section could be further divided into I and II sub sections. The first section consists of questions pertaining to service quality attributes owned by their banks and the second section consists of questions pertaining to those service quality attributes which makes banks an ideal service provider. The B part is concerned with assurance. Questions were focused towards the competence, courtesy and knowledge of the employees in developing trust and confidence in their customers. Questions were of the same pattern as in part A, current service delivery and expected service delivery. The sample size was 40. The C part is concerned with responsiveness. Questions were focused towards promptness of service and willingness of employees to serve their customers. Here, the sample size was 41. All the parts of the questionnaire were administered together. That is from the sample of 81, 40 got questions pertaining to assurance in service quality and the rest 41 got responsiveness in service quality. The statistical test employed was t-test to find out the equality of means among without Service quality and Assurance (A-B), without service quality and Responsiveness (A-C) and between Service qualities (B-C) icmrrjournal@gmail.com

5 Table 2: Summary of Comparison of Attributes of Service Quality S. No. Attributes t-test A-B A-C B-C 1 Prompt service Simplified formalities Competency of employees Redress of complaints Availability of employee at counter Understand Customer Needs Empathy Lesser paper work Reliable Employees Quick response on telephone queries Patient employees Approachable Manager Courteous Employees Personal Care (Source: Primary Data) Conclusion The study was conducted to find out the effectiveness of the service quality on the perception of customer based brand image. The result indicates that attributes of service quality, assurance and responsiveness are diluting the brand. This is particularly true for various service quality aspects, namely prompt service, Simplified formalities, competency of employees, redress of complaints, and availability of employee at counter and understand customer needs. However service quality are not diluting attributes such as empathy, lesser paper work, reliable employees, quick response on telephone queries, patient employees, approachable manager, courteous employees and personal care. Respondents seem to be indifferent to service quality with respect to banking facilities. The conclusions drawn from the study Service quality influence perception of customer based brand image(null hypothesis01 is not supported). Customer s perceptions of brand image on the attributes of assurance and responsiveness are similar icmrrjournal@gmail.com

6 Limitations of the Study Following are the limitations of the study There is only one customer group, namely faculty members of different colleges of the North India. Therefore it is difficult to generalize the findings The variation in customer characteristics on the perception was not obtained. Therefore, result may not reveal the importance of the service quality on brand image. The sample size is not too much to give true picture of the study There is only one service arena namely banking services. Since Banking is only one of the service areas in the market, the result may not be extrapolated to other services. Implication for Marketers Liberalization, Privatization and Globalization plays a vital role in the escalation of Service Industry in India. Indian market is flooded with various multinational and national companies providing services in various service arenas. Service Industry holds major share of GDP that is 62.6% in year (Economic Survey 2009) so it becomes utmost important for Service market players to keep up the Service Quality to sustain and to create customers. Implications for the marketers from the study are 1. Attributes of service quality can dilute perception of brand. Hence companies should enhance their service quality in transforming them in to stronger brand. 2. Marketers should have follow up plan to check the service quality standards, once they are exploited to the market. Scope for Further Research This study opens up new platforms for further research. Further studies can address the following issues to have more insights about a subject. Further studies should replicate with other service areas like retail, insurance, telecom, hotel industry, entertainment industry etc. The concept of Quality and brand image in service sector or in other industry is yet to be examined in detailed way. The study among heterogeneous sample with different demographic characteristics pertaining to quality and brand image and with respect to product and services will generalized these findings. References Aaker, D.A. (1991), Managing Brand Image, The Free Press, New York, NY. Avedis Donabedian (1989), Institutional and Professional Responsibilities in Quality Assurance International Journal for Quality in HealthCare1:3-11 (1989). Barnes, M. (1987) Construction Project Management, Seminar on Construction Project Management, October, London, UK. Cobb-Walgren, C.J. and Ruble, C.A. (1995), Brand image, brand preference, and purchase intent, Journal of Advertising, Vol. 24 No. 3, pp Crossby, P.B. (1979), Quality is Free: The Art of Making Quality Certain, New American Library, New York, NY. Farquer, P.H (1989), managing brand image, marketing research, vol. 1, pp Feigenbaum, A.V. (1951), Total Quality Control, McGraw-Hill, New York, NY icmrrjournal@gmail.com

7 Garvin, D.A (1984), What does product quality really mean?, Sloan Management Review, pp Juran,J.M. (1951), Quality Control Handbook, McGraw-Hill, NewYork, NY. Keller, K.L. (1993), Conceptualizing, measuring, and managing customer-based brand image, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 57 No. 1, pp Keller, Kevin Lane (2003). Brand Synthesis: The Multidimensionality of Brand Knowledge, Journal of Customer Research, 29 (4), Pariseau S.E & McDaniel J.R (1995), Assessing service quality in schools of business, International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, Vol. 14 No. 3, 1997, pp Pirsig, R.M. (1992), Lila: An Inquiry into Morals, Bantam Books, New York, NY. Reeves, C.A. and Bednar, D. (1994), Defining quality: alternatives and implications, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 19 No. 3, pp Rio, A., Vazquez, R. and Iglesias, V. (2001a), The role of the brand name in obtaining differential advantages, Journal of Product & Brand Management, Vol. 10 No. 7, pp Susan E. Pariseau and J.R. McDaniel (1995), Assessing service quality in schools of business, International Journal of Quality& Reliability Management,Vol. 14 No. 3, 1997, pp Winters, L.C. (1991), ``Brand image measures: some recent advances'', Marketing Research, Vol. 3, pp Wood, L. (2000), Brands and brand image: definition and management, Management Decision, Vol. 38 No. 9, pp