Introduction to Information-Based High-Tech Services

Provides insights into the evolving role of service in high technology companies and shows managers how marketing performance can be improved by designing services that are in line with customer needs and expectations. The text provides analysis of the three critical success factors for high-technology service businesses and examines effective marketing strategies for both consumer and corporate markets. The aim of the text is that readers will discover how to understand the needs of high-technology customers; attract new clients and build customer loyalty; design and monitor top-quality services; organize and manage human resources for peak service performance; and develop effective competitive, pricing and distribution strategies.

1. Understanding the Nature of High-Tech Services
1. What are services?
1. Services as an output
2. Services as a process: The three categories of services
2. What are high-tech services?
1. High-tech services: A definition
2. High-tech services: A list
3. The attributes of high-tech services
4. The strategic trade-off in high-tech services
3. The new rules of high-tech services
1. The virtual value chain model
2. The new economics of high-tech services
4. Conclusion: The key success factors in high-tech services
5. Chapter summary
2. Placing Customers at the Center of High-Tech Services
1. The customer relationship life cycle
2. Identifying and understanding customers
1. Understanding the high-tech services consumer
2. Understanding high-tech services business customers
3. Some specific purchasing criteria for high-tech services: the attitude toward innovation and risk
3. Creating customer loyalty
1. The impact of customer loyalty on profitability
2. How to gain and retain a customer?
3. Evaluating customer satisfaction
4. Chapter summary
3. Quality for High-Tech Services
1. Quality process design and implementation
1. The difference between the user's expectations and the specifications of the service
2. The variance between the specifications of the service and the actual service delivery
3. The gap between the service delivery and its perception by the customer
4. The gap between customers' expectations of a service and their perception of the service provided
2. Achieving quality of high-tech services for business customers
1. Developing and using fool-proof software and solutions
2. The right offer to the customer: the procedure for quality processes
3. Achieving quality of high-tech services for consumers on the web
1. Developing a quality solution for the Web
2. Answering broader consumer needs
4. Chapter summary
4. Organizing Human Resources for High-Tech Services
1. Why are human resources determinant in the high-tech services business?
1. The impact of employees on customers
2. The impact of employees on quality
3. The impact of the costs of people on profitability
2. Organizing the human resources of high-tech services forms for performance
1. Organizing for business-to-business high-tech services
2. Organizing for business-to-consumer high-tech services
3. Chapter summary
5. Effectively Managing Human Resources
1. People care as a core value
2. The effective recruitment of the right profile
1. Selling capacity
2. Business sense
3. Project management capacity
4. Technical expertise
3. Cogent training
4. professional development
5. People management
1. Full empowerment
2. Clear performance specifications
6. Internal communication and feedback
7. Evaluation and remuneration
8. Chapter summary
6. The Marketing Strategy for High-Tech Services
1. Achieving relationship marketing and conceiving new high-tech services
2. The importance of brand image
3. Communicating service value
1. Communicating before the service performance
2. Communicating during the service performance
3. Communicating after the service performance
4. The communication mix for high-tech services
1. The communication tools to promote high-tech services
2. Publicity and advertising on the Web
5. The pricing policy for high-tech services
1. Pricing options
2. Revenue models
6. Chapter summary
7. The Challenges Ahead For High-Tech Services

Tries to explain what kind of companies the new generation of managers are trying to build and the challenges that they face.