1. Chapter Ten Services and Other Intangibles:
Marketing the Product that Isn’t there
Chapter Ten
Chapter 10

2. Chapter Objectives
Describe the characteristics of services and the ways marketers classify services
Appreciate the importance of service quality to marketers
Explain the marketing of people, places, and ideas
LECTURE NOTES:
By the end of this chapter, you should be able to:
Describe the characteristics of services and the ways marketers classify services
Appreciate the importance of service quality to marketers
Explain the marketing of people, places, and ideas

3. Marketing What Isn’t There
Intangibles: Services and other experience-based products that cannot be touched
Examples: concerts, movies, tax preparation, hair styling, college education, online banking, etc.
Does marketing work for intangibles? Yes!
INSTRUCTOR NOTE:
It might be interesting to begin discussion of this slide by asking students what going to the movies has in common with getting an education at college or banking online.
LECTURE NOTES:
Intangibles include services and other experience-based products that cannot be touched. Several examples are shown on her on the slide
The answer to what education has in common with going to the movies is that each of these items represents an intangible “product” that combines experiences with physical goods to create an event that the buyer consumes. Other examples of intangibles include concerts, tax preparation services, hair styling, advertising, and more.
Of course many services actually combine experiences with physical goods as part of the delivery of that service. For example, many movies are seen in a theatres – theatre seats and the sound system are goods that compliment the delivery of the movie experience.
WEB SITE NOTES:
Time permitting, visit the E*Trade website and challenge students to ID the various experience-based products available there

4. What is a Service?
Services: Acts, efforts, or performances exchanged from producer to user without ownership rights
Services accounted for 75% of US employment in 2010
Services may target consumers and/or businesses
LECTURE NOTES:
Services satisfy needs when they provide pleasure (movie theatre showings), information (advertising), or convenience (online banking).
Services in the US accounted for over 2/3 of the US gross domestic product. Many forms of marketing careers fall within the service industry (advertising, research, sales, retail, etc.)
Consumer services are easy to identify. Many of these same services (lawn care, insurance, security for example), are also targeted towards businesses, though the scope of services provided to consumers vs. businesses may differ substantially. However, there are also some services and service providers who specifically target businesses exclusively.
DISCUSSION NOTE:
Ask students if they can come up with some examples.
POTENTIAL ANSWERS: Consulting, food services

5. Figure 10.1 Characteristics of Services
LECTURE NOTES:
All services share four key characteristics.
Intangibility: Can’t see, touch, or smell a service. This means services can’t be inspected or tried prior to purchase, which makes it much more difficult to evaluate services offered by different providers. Thus marketers rely on physical cues to reassure the buyer that they are buying a good service. Cues might include the “look” of the facility, its furnishings, lighting, cleanliness, employee appearance, web site or advertising.
Perishability: Services can’t be stored for later sale or consumption and instead MUST be used at the time they are available. There are so many appointment periods in a doctor’s day An empty slot at 8 am cannot be saved and used later. Capacity management allows firms to adjust their services to match supply with demand. We’ll discuss capacity management in more detail soon.
Variability: Even the same service performed by the same person will vary when delivered on different days or at different times. Lack of standardization is often perceived as a problem. Training can minimize wide variations in service delivery, but it is often difficult to eliminate entirely. Explicit standards and operating procedures may also help to minimize variability, while mystery shoppers and customer feedback can be used to identify cases of poor service quality. However, in many cases, the variability of services actually allows different customers to customize services to their preferences (unique hairstyles).
Inseparability: Because services must be experienced to be used, it is impossible to separate the production of a service from its consumption. Its difficult to detach the expertise, skill, and personality of a provider from the firm’s employees (especially when services are delivered by people). 5

6. How Services Differ from Goods
Chapter 12 Services and Nonprofit Organization Marketing
How Services Differ from Goods
Intangible
Perishable
Heterogeneous or Variable
Inseparable
No physical object makes it hard to communicate benefits.
Services cannot be saved, and it is challenging to synchronize supply and demand.
Services depend on their employees for quality, which makes consistency difficult to achieve.
Notes:
Intangibility: Services cannot be touched, seen, tasted, heard, or felt in the same way as goods. Tangible cues are often used to communicate a service’s quality and nature. Facilities are a critical tangible part of a service experience.
Inseperability: Services are often sold, produced, and consumed at the same time. Consumers are involved in the production of the services that they buy. The quality of services depends on the quality of employees.
Heterogeneity: Services are less standardized and uniform than goods. Because services tend to be labor-intensive, consistency and quality control can be hard to achieve. Standardization and training help increase consistency and reliability.
Perishability: Services cannot be stored, warehoused, or inventoried. One of the most important challenges in many service industries is finding ways to synchronize supply and demand.
Production and consumption are simultaneous, meaning the consumer takes part in production. 2

7. Table 10.1 Marketing Strategies for Different Service Characteristics
LECTURE NOTES:
Furthermore, marketers must realize that consumers often make decisions about services based on related aspects that can be observed, such as employee uniforms, facility appearance, and internal furnishings. This means that businesses must pay particular attention to these aspects if they want to be perceived favorably.
Additional marketing strategies that attempt to compensate for the characteristics unique to services are summarized here. 7

8. Marketing Services
Marketers often use vivid imagery in advertising to help market intangibles
LECTURE NOTES:
The intangible nature of services creates challenges for marketers. For example, vivid imagery is often used when marketing services to compensate for the lack of tangibility.

9. Marketing Services
Disintermediation occurs when the Internet or other technology can be used to “cut-out the middleman”
Capacity management allows firms to adjust their services to match supply with demand
a How do hotels or airlines manage capacity?
LECTURE NOTES:
Disintermediation: The collapse of the travel agent industry coincided with increases in the Internet penetration rate and the arrival of online booking services such as Travelocity and Expedia. The commission paid to online retailers by airlines was so small, that when commissions were reduced among brick and mortar travel agents to match this rate, the vast majority of travel agencies could not survive. In 2010, Southwest Airlines made the bold move of offering ticket sales ONLY through their website, and thereby disintermediating online travel agencies.
Capacity management. Restaurants manage capacity in a variety of ways. “Early Bird Specials” offer meal price discounts to those who are willing to eat supper at 4:00 pm or 4:30 pm. These specials are popular with retirees, and help the restaurant to manage their capacity by shifting some users to less popular times of the day so that someone else can be served in their place when demand is high.
A less obvious form of capacity management occurs when restaurants refuse to take reservations on the weekends. Capacity is maximized, because individuals are seated on a first-come, first-served basis, and restaurants don’t have to worry about holding an empty table for someone who may or may not show up to claim their reservation.
A controversial method of capacity management in the airline industry involves overbooking (taking more reservations than there are seats available). Although there are typically a few passengers who don’t make their scheduled flight for one reason or another, sometimes airlines run out of seats for ticketed customers. Often flight attendants will ask for volunteers who would be willing to take a later flight, and reward volunteers who agree with vouchers for discounts off future travel on the airline. Sometimes the airline will transfer a traveler to a competitor’s airline. But often they simply turn away travelers from the gate and rebook them on a later flight. Who gets bumped? Typically it’s the person who paid the lowest fare, regardless of when he or she purchased their ticket, as well as those that show up late and miss the main boarding call.
DISCUSSION NOTES:
Capacity management in hotel or resort management may take the form of seasonal discounts, designed to entice cost-oriented consumers to stay during times of the year that are otherwise less attractive, or special pricing incentives for either weekday or weekend stay, depending upon the type of hotel. For example, hotels that cater to business people have little problem with weekday occupancy, but Fridays and Saturdays may suffer from poor occupancy. Weekend getaway packages may be advertised in the local market to try and attract those interested in a weekend’s romance, or the hotel may host a “Mystery Weekends”, in which guests pay not only to stay, but also to participate in a murder mystery adventure.
Many casinos aren’t even profitable on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday nights, whereas the casino may enjoy standing room only on a Friday or Saturday night. Casinos do attempt to manage capacity (with various degrees of success) by offering special gaming tournaments (slot tournaments, poker tournaments) during weekdays or by advertising buffet specials to the local market. Some casinos also bring in musical acts on Thursdays, in an attempt to encourage those who might otherwise stop by on Friday or Saturday to visit a little earlier in the week.

10. Characteristics of Services
Service encounter: Interaction between the customer and service provider
Service encounter dimensions:
Social contact dimension
Physical dimension
The quality of service is only as good as its worst employee
LECTURE NOTES:
The social contact dimension refers to that fact that in many service encounters, one person (say a server), interacts with another person (customer). Often, it’s the interaction itself that can make or break a service encounter. The most delicious meal can be ruined by a server who doesn’t get it to the table on time, who forgets the wine, or who is rude to the customers that he or she serves. The interaction element often results in a “moment of truth” meaning that the employee determines whether the customer leaves with a positive or negative impression. The quality of the service is only as good as the business’ worst employee.
The physical dimension of the service encounter means that customers pay close attention to facilities as cues of what to expect in the way of service quality. For example, where would you expect a better experience -- at a well-lit, clean restaurant with attractive furnishings or one that has sticky, stained menus with prices crossed out and rewritten, booths with cuts in the faux leather and sprung springs, and flickering lights?

11. Classifying Services LECTURE NOTES:
Services can be classified according to whether they are performed directly on the customer (haircut) or on something the customers owns (oil change for car), and whether the service itself consists of tangible (heart transplant results in a new heart) or intangible (knowledge imparted through college courses) actions.
In reality, most products are a combination of a goods and services. Even tangible goods such as furniture contain service components, such as “stain-proofing” and furniture delivery and set up. Thus products vary in terms of their level of tangibility and most tend be dominated by either intangible or intangible elements

12. Classifying Services Goods-dominated products
Firms that sell tangible products still provide support services
Equipment- or facility-based services
Operational factors, locational factors, and environmental factors are important (amusement parks)
People-based services
Increasing in importance as people lack the time or expertise to do on their own
LECTURE NOTES:
To better make sense of how services are classified, it may be helpful to think of service offerings as falling into one of three categories.
Goods dominated products will still offer some type of support service, such as warranties, phone numbers, or FAQ sections of the brand website. In B2B markets, the service aspect cannot be ignored as most firms would simply refuse to consider a vendor that did not offer expected services (training on how to use a copy machine for example, or online ordering of toner). Brands that offer superior service can realize a competitive advantage (e.g., faster service when fixing a copier).
Equipment- or facility-based services are those that include a mixture of tangible and intangible elements. Airlines, tanning salons, and automatic car washes are a few examples. Operational, locational, environmental factors should be of concern to marketers. Here’s why:
Operational factors: Signs and guidelines help firms minimize wait times. Many hotels have moved to check-out via the in-room TV system to minimize wait time. Warehouse clubs such as Sam’s have roving employees that prescan consumers’ purchases while waiting line.
Locational factors: especially important for frequently used services – goal is to locate service centers where most convenient. Thus there are multiple ATM locations for a particular bank branch, for example. Restaurants locate near major employers or other shopping venues.
Environmental factors: Atmospheric factors such as lighting, design, color, art can create attractive environments for consumers. Strong lighting in the parking lot and key card entry systems that lock outer doors after 10 pm can promote a safe environment for hotel guests.
Lawyers, doctors, personal trainers, entertainers, agents, athletes/professional sports teams, educators—each of these examples falls under the people-based service category.
ASK students to provide examples of equipment or facility based operational factors, locational factors, and environmental factors.
Potential examples

13. Core and Augmented Services
Core service:
The benefit a customer gets from the service
Augmented service:
Additional services that enhance value
Augmented services help to differentiate businesses from one another
LECTURE NOTES:
While customers generally seek a core service, it’s often the augmented services which provide extra value that differentiate one business from another.
For example, Porters Dry Cleaners is a high-end dry cleaning chain in Northwest Louisiana. They offer augmented services in the form of curbside pick up (employees come out to get dry cleaning) and covered parking to patrons, along with their core fine dry cleaning services and bridal gown preservation. What type of augmented services are offered by hotels? {Answers: restaurant, in-room Internet, business center, concierge assistance}
Let’s watch this short video clip, and see whether you can identify the core and augmented services offered by Wellbeing.

14. The Service Encounter Physical elements of the service encounter
Servicescape: Environment in which the service is delivered and where the firm and customer interact
Servicescapes influence purchase decisions, service quality evaluations and customer satisfaction
LECTURE NOTES:
Because services are intangible, marketers must pay careful attention to the physical evidence of the service, called the servicescape.
Servicescapes include facility exteriors – the outer building, the landscape, parking lot, etc., as well as facility interior elements – design, color, air quality, temperature, smells, etc.
Consideration of the servicescape is critical, as they influence consumer perceptions in a number of ways. Thus the servicescape should project the image desired for the business.
However, there are some services that come to customers instead of relying on customers to visit a designated location (leak detection services, some fencing companies, pop-a-lock) etc. If the customer doesn’t visit the service providers office, facility exterior and interior considerations will not influence customer perceptions.
Instead, customers may look towards the VEHICLE delivering the service provider for cues that can influence their perceptions. (Is the car or truck clean? New? Dented? Well-maintained?)

15. The Service Encounter Web sites influence customer perceptions
First stop for many potential customers
Poor navigation, unattractive sites offer negative first impressions
SEO (search engine optimization) is critical for getting noticed
Also consider paid search advertising
LECTURE NOTES:
Today, the brand or service provider’s website often provides strong cues to customers that influence their perceptions of service quality and other factors. Marketers should strive to provide websites that function well (load quickly, links work, easy to navigate or search) and are attractive.
Marketers should implement SEO strategies in an effort to make certain that their website is displayed on the first page of natural search results when the services offered are Googled or otherwise searched for using a search engine. Otherwise, consumers will select a competitor’s web site to visit.
Alternately, many providers today are turning to paid search advertising, such as the GOOGLE ADWORDS program. (If the link provided does not work, go to to GOOGLE and search on “AdWords” for a direct link.

16. Providing Quality Service
Quality service ensures that customers are satisfied with what they have paid for
Satisfaction is based on customer expectations
Not all customers expect the same level of service
Not all customers can be satisfied
LECTURE NOTES:
If a service experience is not positive, dissatisfied customers will often complain to other people. This is called negative word-of-mouth, and the effects of negative WOM can be very powerful, as some people may be influenced to avoid a particular service provider while others may share the negative WOM second hand with their friends or contacts.
Unfortunately, satisfaction with services is relative because each service user will compare the service provided to a set of expectations. Expectations can be formed on the basis of marketing communications (which is why marketers should NEVER promise more than a service provider can offer); they can also be formed on the basis of previous service encounters. Thus the same service might be perceived as “great” by individual “A” but as mediocre by individual “B” who has been spoiled by outstanding service in earlier encounters. Marketers’ goal should be to exceed the customer’s expectations, thereby creating strong customer satisfaction.
Furthermore, it is not always possible to meet, much less exceed, expectations. Exaggerated expectations account for 75%of customer complaints. Explanations for service failures, and compensating customers for bad experiences can help to retail customers over time.

17. Service Quality Attributes
Search qualities:
Characteristics that the consumer can examine before purchase
Experience qualities:
Characteristics that buyers can determine during or after consumption
Credence qualities:
Characteristics that are difficult to evaluate even after they have been experienced
LECTURE NOTES:
Search qualities: Characteristics that the consumer can examine before purchase, such as color, style, fit, and price. Since many services are intangible, services need to focus on how uniforms, or room décor as proxies for these search qualities.
Experience qualities: Characteristics that buyers can determine during or after consumption. For example, it’s difficult to predict how good of a time one will have on vacation, so marketers use their communications to try and reassure consumers before the fact that they will enjoy their stay, so long as false expectations aren’t set.
Credence qualities: Characteristics that are difficult to evaluate even after they have been experienced. For example, most people don’t have the knowledge or ability to know whether a physician’s diagnosis is correct. It’s only after the surgery has been performed or the medicine has been taken, that consumers will know – based on whether they recover from their illness or not.

18. When Services are Assessed
Chapter 12 Services and Nonprofit Organization Marketing
When Services are Assessed
Search Quality: Before the purchase
What does the shop look like? Is it clean?
Experience Quality: After the purchase
How was the meal? How was your stay?
Credence Quality: Requires knowledge
Web MD
Vidal Sassoon-If you don’t look good…
Notes:
Evaluating the quality of services is harder than evaluating the quality of goods.
A search quality is a characteristic that can be easily assessed before purchase. Compared to goods, services tend to exhibit fewer search qualities.
Services tend to exhibit more experience and credence qualities. An experience quality is a characteristic that can be assessed only after use.
A credence quality is a characteristic that consumers may have difficulty assessing even after purchase because they do not have the necessary knowledge or experience.
Online
Web MD
What elements of Web MD Web site communicate the search, experience, and credence qualities of the services offered by online medical consultant? 2

19. Measuring Service Quality
Several methods of measuring service quality exist:
Mystery shoppers
Lost customers
SERVQUAL scale
Gap analysis
Critical incident technique
LECTURE NOTES:
Because of the strong link between the customer’s experience, their satisfaction level, and the likelihood that they will return to a given service provider in the future, service marketers need to evaluate the quality of the service. Several methods of evaluating service quality exist.
Mystery shoppers may be hired by airlines, restaurants, hotels or other types of service providers to pose as a customer, evaluate various aspects of the service or staff delivering the service, and report back. Results of mystery shopping visits are often used to evaluate the quality of customer service provided by staff members.
Some firms specifically seek out “lost customers” – those who no longer do business with the firm – for the purpose of identifying why they stopped patronizing the service provider. Once key problems are identified in this manner, management takes actions to fix each.
The SERVQUAL scale is a popular instrument (set of questions) that has been used to successfully assess consumers’ perceptions of service quality.
We’ll talk more about the SERVQUAL scale, the gap analysis and critical incident techniques in the upcoming slides.

20. Measuring Service Quality
SERVQUAL scale (questionnaire) measures customer perceptions of five key dimensions
Tangibles
Reliability
Responsiveness
Assurance
Empathy
LECTURE NOTES:
The SERVQUAL research has identified five dimensions (or components) of service quality:
Tangibles: the physical facilities and equipment and the professional appearance of the personnel
Reliability: the ability to provide dependably and accurately what was promised
Responsiveness: the willingness to help customer sand provide prompt service
Assurance: the knowledge and courtesy of employees and the ability to convey trust and confidence
Empathy: the degree of caring and individual attention customer receive
The SERVQUAL instrument is used by thousands of businesses. It is usually administered in a survey format (paper and pen survey, internet survey, or in much rarer instances, phone survey). Such firms will often track these ratings over time (in what is called a longitudinal study) to document how service quality is improving (hopefully).

21. Figure 10.2 The Gap Model of Service Delivery
LECTURE NOTES:
Gap analysis evaluates service quality by gauging the difference between a customer’s expectation of service quality and what actually occurs. The idea behind this technique is that by identifying specific places in the service delivery system where the gap between expectations and actual service quality varies widely, service marketers can better understand what needs improvement. Of course it is a bit more complex than that as the “Gap model of service delivery” identifies five potential points in the service delivery process where significant gaps may occur.
Gap between consumers’ expectations and management’s perceptions: when manager’s don’t understand what consumers expect, a major quality gap exists.
Gap between management’s perceptions and quality standards set by the firm: Without a quality control program, service quality suffers, particularly in the areas of responsiveness, accuracy, and timeliness.
Gap between established quality standards and service delivery: One of the largest threats to service quality is poor employee performance. Unfortunately, many firms don’t clearly specify what is expected of employees.
Gap between service quality standards and consumers’ expectations: Service firms should never promise something that they can’t deliver – instead they are better off communicating exactly what customers should expect and what will happen if those expectations are not met. 21

22. Strategic Issues in Delivering Service Quality
Additional methods of measuring service quality:
Critical incident technique uses customers’ complaints to identify problems that lead to dissatisfaction
Maximizing the likelihood that a customer will use a service and become a loyal user requires:
Development of effective marketing strategies
Fast and appropriate responses to service failures
LECTURE NOTES:
As the chapter consistently states, service providers struggle to market something that isn’t there (e.g., is intangible). Getting customers to use a service and stay loyal to the provider is a challenge. Similar to goods marketing, the first step is to devise effective marketing strategies that can reach key objectives. Table 10.2 illustrates how three different types of service organizations might devise effective marketing strategies.
To err is human Thus mistakes happen. No matter when and how service failures are discovered, the best thing a firm can do to cement a relationship with the customer is respond quickly in resolving the problem. Research shows that customers whose complaints are resolved quickly are far more likely to buy from the same company again than are those people whose complaints take longer to resolve.
Managers need to understand the potential points where service failures can occur so that they can plan HOW to recover ahead of time. This is why it is so important to identify critical incidents. Employees must be trained to LISTEN for complaints and empowered (allowed) to take actions immediately. When service failures occur, hotel clerks are often allowed to comp meals or even a night’s stay WITHOUT managerial approval (which takes time).

23. Table 10.2 Marketing Strategies for Service Organizations
LECTURE NOTES:
Table 10.2 illustrates how three different types of service organizations could devise effective strategies. Let’s take a quick look at these examples now. 23

24. Marketing People, Places, and Ideas
Politicians and celebrities are commonly marketed
Consultants “package” celebrities
Name changes are common
LECTURE NOTES:
Services are just one type of intangible – People, places, and ideas are other intangibles requiring marketing.
Marketing people: Whether it’s a job candidate marketing themselves to a potential employer or an actress auditioning for a movie role, people often find themselves in need of marketing. Actresses routinely undergo facelifts or other forms of plastic surgery to improve their marketability. Image consultants recommend changes in grooming, hair styles, and wardrobe for politicians, celebrities, CEOs, or even “regular people”. These activities represent “packaging” for people.
Sometimes celebrities rename themselves to craft a brand identity. Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta is better known as Lady Gaga, for example. Her stage name was inspired by the Queen song “Radio Ga Ga” and in 2010 she laid claim to the most Facebook friends of any living person with over 11 million. A lot of corporate marketing gurus could take a lesson or two from Lady Gaga’s marketing playbook!
Memorability, suitability, and distinctiveness are benefits associated with renaming.

25. Table 10.3 Strategies to Sell Celebrities
LECTURE NOTES:
Table 10.3 lists three approaches that are commonly used to cell strategies.
The Pure Selling Approach – agents present their celebrities qualifications to various intermediaries who might need the individual’s services.
Product Improvement Approach – The agent works with the client to modify certain characteristics that will increase his/her market value.
The Market Fulfillment Approach – an agent scans the market to ID unmet needs. After identifying a need, the agent finds a person or group that meets a set of minimum qualifications and develops a “new product” that matches what consumers want 25

26. Marketing People, Places, and Ideas
Place marketing strategies treat a city, state, country, or other locale as a brand (Epcot, Florida)
LECTURE NOTES:
Marketing places can involve creating appeals that promote a city, state, country, or other locale (e.g., Mall of America) to one or more traveler segments. Segments that may be targeted include meeting planners, convention, association, or trade show planners, business travelers and/or corporate travel agents (who book general travel or incentive/rewards travel) or individual/family tourists and tour groups who comprise the leisure segment.
The marketing of Las Vegas as a tourist destination has changed course several times. First they tried to clean up the city’s original image as a den of corruption and vice to encourage family visits. Then they switched direction and plugged the city’s bawdy roots with the slogan “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.” Oops, then the recession hit and companies clamped down on business and convention travel to “Sin City.” Now, Vegas no longer promotes its famous tagline as it opens its arms to families once again with all sorts of kid-friendly activities and incentives.
On a more local level, Shreveport-Bossier, in Louisiana shares more characteristics with East Texas than it does with New Orleans, and now markets itself using the “Louisiana’s Other Side" campaign. Visit the tourism website to learn more!

27. Marketing People, Places, and Ideas
Marketing ideas
Gaining market share for a concept, philosophy, belief, or issue
Example: Religious institutions market ideas about faith
Consumers often do not perceive the value they receive when they conform with an idea or fail to believe an idea is worth its ultimate cost
LECTURE NOTES:
Idea marketing refers to marketing strategies designed to gain market share for a concept, philosophy, belief, or issue. Charities market the idea that donations to worthy causes can make a difference; religions market faith; antidrug ads market the negative consequences of drug use.
Unfortunately, the marketing of ideas is often very difficult because consumers do not perceive when they act in accordance with a particular idea or philosophy. Others fail to believe that an idea is worth the cost (e.g., minimizing global warming).
Joel Osteen

28. The Future of Services New dominant logic for marketing:
Service is the central core deliverable in every exchange
Services will continue to grow due to several factors:
Changing demographics
Globalization
Technological advances
Proliferation of information
LECTURE NOTES:
The new dominant logic for marketing means that we must rethink our traditional distinction between services and goods. Physical products involved are relatively minor in terms of their contribution to the value proposition while the service aspect is the central element in each exchange.
A number of trends exist that will present challenges and opportunities to service marketers in the future.
Changing demographics: The surge in the birth rate following World War II created the baby boom. As this large group continues to age, service industries which appeal to this demographic will be in high demand (retirement communities, health care, assisted living, etc.)
Globalization: This trend will increase the need for distribution, logistical, accounting, and legal services that have specialized international knowledge. Globalization also means greater competition; for example, US Hospitals will need to compete for elective surgeries with medical facilities in other countries that cost much less.
Technological advances: Improvements in technology offer service providers opportunity for growth in the telecommunications, health care, and Internet service industries. Innovation is also likely as some services which will be offered in the future haven’t even been thought of yet.
Proliferation of information: The availability, flow and access to information are critical to the success of organizations. Database services, artificial intelligence systems and communications systems in general stand to benefit in the future.