Presentation on how Social Media can assist in narrowing Service Gaps, as described by the Service Quality Model (also known as the GAP Model, 1985). Ideas on how Social Media can assist in closing some of the 'gaps' that can lead to unsuccessful delivery of service and consequently enhance customers' experience.

1. How Social Media can assist
in narrowing Service Gaps?
1
Joanna Michaels
March 2012

2. Social Media Statistics, UK 2011
2
50 % of the UK population (approx. 30 mln;
source: Joanna Shields, VP of Facebook Europe,
March 2011).
13 % of the UK population (approx. 7 mln,
source: Wikipedia, Jan 2011)
7 % (approx.6 mln plus,
source: Linkedin Press Centre, March 2011)

3. Social Media & Customer Gap
3
Social Media:
Spreading the word of mouse.
Customer Customer
Clarifying expectations and
Expectations Perceptions
perceptions.

4. Social Media & Customer Gap
4
Platforms:
BLOGS, assessment of services and products; sharing comments and
discussions under the post
LINKEDIN Group Discussions, high reliability factor due to professional
character of the platform
TRIP ADVISOR, 40 million global users a month; cooperation with Facebook
AMAZON, customer ranking and reviews

5. Social Media & Customer Gap
5
Key Factors
Development of New Customer Decision’s process
Review sharing is based on human trust and communication with real users
Learning from experiences of others helps in narrowing down choices
Result
Researching customer reviews became a mainstream activity and a critical
element of pre purchase process
Decisions are being made far away from the company’s website
Possible limitations
Where everyone is a critic… the question of reliability (“The Attack of Trip
Advisors”)

6. Social Media & Provider Gap:
The Listening Gap
6
Social Media: Company’s
Customer Where Listening is the key. understanding of
 Customer Exp
Expectations Listen then Engage. these
Increased Understanding. expectations

7. Social Media & Listening Gap
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Social Media a platform for Market Research
Key Factors
 High Visibility: Access to wide range of current
and potential customers
 Authenticity: Listening to customers in environment
where they feel comfortable
Financial Factors: Gathering valuable suggestions/ideas (crowd-sourcing) as
a mean to reducing product/service development expenditure
photo credit: celinenadeau</a> via photopin</a> cc</a>

8. Social Media & Listening Gap
8
Examples
How companies use social media for enhancing the understanding of customers’
preferences?
“My Starbucks Idea”; Starbucks’ own version of a social network, customers can
share their ideas and expectations on Starbuck products and services
“Ideas in Action”(blog), managed by Starbucks employees, what happens with
suggestions from the audience?
 “Dell’s Idea Storm” (very similar initiative)

9. Social Media & Listening Gap
9
 IMPORTANT: Using Monitoring Tools for filtering the buzz, especially for the
negative comments
Useful Tools:
 Technorati – searches through the blogosphere.
 Google Blog Search – searches through the blogosphere.
 BlogPulse – searches through the blogosphere.
 Twitter Search – provides results only from Twitter.
 OneRiot – searches just the URLs shared on Twitter.
 FriendFeed – searches through variety of social media platforms.
photo credit: kanelstrand</a> via photopin</a> cc</a>

10. Social Media & Listening Gap
10
 SOCIAL MEDIA a platform of detecting the most popular customer trends
within specific sector
Key Factors
 Monitoring topic popularity/ lack of
 Detecting the growing trend and getting involved
 Starting a trend and monitoring its progress
 Identifying opportunities when looking for new product or service
photo credit: Mike Chen aka Full Time Taekwondo Dad </a> via photopin</a> cc</a>

11. Social Media & Listening Gap
11
 IMPORTANT: Majority of tools allow search results as time-based line graphs
and filtering results down to individual search result: news article, blog post, or
tweet that mentioned the keyword.
Useful Tools:
 Google Trends – displays the keyword search volume and news articles over
time, including search volume within geographic regions, cities, and languages.
 bing xRank – displays the keyword search volume over time, including related
keyword phrases, news, videos, and images.
 Trendrr – searches through a range of social media sites and displays the
keyword search volume on each over time.
 BlogPulse – searches through the blogosphere and displays uses of the keyword
over time.
 Hashtags – searches through Twitter’s hashtags and displays uses of the
hashtag (if it exists) over time

12. Social Media & Listening Gap
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Possible Limitations
The risk of risk of overvaluing social media feedback.
Self Selective audience.
Heterogenous audience.
All platforms have inherent biases based on the types of people who use their
services.

13. Social Media & Listening Gap
13
SOCIAL MEDIA a platform for Service Recovery
Key Factors
The threat of unanswered complaints
Time of response
Problem or Opportunity?
photo credit: Life As Art</a> via photopin</a> cc</a>

14. Social Media & Listening Gap
14
Service Recovery : The winners and the losers
Case Studies:
Nestle. The sticky side of social media.
Domino’s pizza. Embracing Criticism.
Ryanair. Lunatic bloggers.

15. Social Media & Listening Gap
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SOCIAL MEDIA a platform for Service Recovery: Things to remember
Social media means that companies have to accept their brand is being
discussed, both in positive and negative ways
Hiding away from criticism leaves you with no control over the conversation
Being defensive and arrogant will get you nowhere: Do not insult your customers
Focus on long-term business strategy rather than the immediate need to repress
criticism
Development of Policies and Employee’s training

16. References
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 Richardson, N. ,Gosnay, R.M. and Carroll A., A quick start guide to Social Media Marketing. High- impact, low cost
marketing that works. 2010. London: Kogan Page ltd.
 Scott, D.M. New Rules of Marketing and PR. 2010, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
 Zeithaml, V.A, Bitner, M.J. and Geler, D.D. Marketing Services. Integrating Customer Focus across the Firm. 5th ed,
2009.
 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/8356755/Facebook-used-by-half-the-UK-population.html (Accessed: 4
October 2011).
 http://www.medialifemagazine.com/artman2/publish/social-media/The-power-of-consumer-product-reviews.asp
(Accessed: 20 October 2011).
 http://www.socitm.net/press/article/129/council_ict_managers_should_lead_their_organisations_to_embrace_social_media_rath
(Accessed: 28 October 2011).
 http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/detail?itemId=1081912566&type=RESOURCES (Accessed: 10 November
2011).

17. References
17
 http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2009/feb/25/ryanair-socialnetworking (Accessed: 21 October 2011).
 http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-20000805-36.html (Accessed: 8 November 2011).
 http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/5426/How-Dominos-is-Using-Customer-Feedback-and-Social-Media-
Outreach-to-Reinvent-Its-Brand.aspx (Accessed: 21 October 2011).
 http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/218751/how_not_to_use_twitter_learn_from_kenneth_cole.html
(Accessed: 15 January 2012).