Services Marketing : People, Technology, Strategy

Focusing on applications and practical training, this first Canadian edition demonstrates how to develop successful marketing strategies using Canadian examples and cases. Exploring concepts and techniques for an exceptionally broad range of service categories and industries, the text reinforces management applications with boxed features highlighting provocative research and profiles from Canada's service-based economy.

Christopher Lovelock is one of the pioneers of services marketing. Based in Massachusetts, he consults and gives seminars and workshops for managers around the world, with a particular focus on strategic planning in services and managing the customer experience. Since 2001, he has been an adjunct professor at the Yale School of Management, where he teaches an MBA services marketing course.

            After obtaining a BCom and an MA in economics from the University of Edinburgh, he worked in advertising with the London office of J. Walter Thompson Co. and then in corporate planning with Canadian Industries Ltd. in Montreal.  Later, he obtained an MBA from Harvard and a PhD from Stanford, where he was also a postdoctoral fellow.

            Professor Lovelock’s distinguished academic career has included 11 years on the faculty of the Harvard Business School and two years as a visiting professor at IMD in Switzerland.  He has also held faculty appointments at Berkeley, Stanford, and the Sloan School at MIT, as well as visiting professorships at INSEAD in France and The University of Queensland in Australia.

            Author or co-author of over 60 articles, more than 100 teaching cases, and 26 books, Dr Lovelock has seen his work translated into ten languages. He serves on the editorial review boards of the International Journal of Service Industry Management, Journal of Service Research, Service Industries Journal, Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly, and Marketing Management, and is also an ad hoc reviewer for the Journal of Marketing.  

            Widely acknowledged as a thought leader in services, Christopher Lovelock has been honored by the American Marketing Association’s prestigious Award for Career Contributions in the Services Discipline. In 2005 his article with Evert Gummesson, “Whither Services Marketing?  In Search of a New Paradigm and Fresh Perspectives” won the AMA’s Best Services Article Award and was a finalist for the IBM award for the best article in the Journal of Service Research. Earlier, he received a best article award from the Journal of Marketing . Recognized many times for excellence in case writing, he has twice won top honors in the BusinessWeek “European Case of the Year” Award. 

Jochen Wirtz has worked in the field of services for more than 18 years, and holds a Ph.D. in services marketing from the London Business School. He is a tenured associate professor at the National University of Singapore, where he teaches services marketing in executive, MBA, and undergraduate programs and is co-director of the dual degree UCLA – NUS Executive MBA Program.

            Professor Wirtz’s research focuses on service management topics, including customer satisfaction, service guarantees and revenue management. He has published over 60 academic articles, 80 conference papers, and some 50 book chapters, and is co-author of ten books, including his latest book Flying High in a Competitive Industry – Cost-effective Service Excellence at Singapore Airlines (McGraw Hill, 2006).

            Professor Wirtz has received seven awards for outstanding teaching at the NUS Business School and in 2003 was honored by the prestigious, university-wide “Outstanding Educator Award” at the National University of Singapore.  His six research awards include the Emerald Literati Club 2003 Award for Excellence for the year’s most outstanding article in the International Journal of Service Industry Management.  He serveson the editorial review boards of seven academic journals, including the International Journal of Service Industry Management, Journal of Service Research, and Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly, and is also an ad hoc reviewer for the Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Marketing.  Professor Wirtz chaired the American Marketing Association’s biennial Service Research Conference in 2005, and in 2006 he was the Chair for the Services Marketing Track at the Academy of Marketing Science Annual Conference.

            Dr Wirtz has been an active management consultant, working with international consulting firms, including Accenture, Arthur D, Little, and KPMG, and major service firms in the areas of strategy, business development and customer feedback systems.  Originally from Germany, Jochen Wirtz spent seven years in London before moving to Asia.

Harvir S. Bansal is an associate professor of marketing at Wilfrid Laurier University, where he teaches courses in services marketing in the undergraduate, executive, and MBA programs. He obtained a BSc (Pure Sciences) and an MBA (Marketing) from India and later earned his Ph.D. from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. His research interests are focused in the area of services marketing with emphasis on customer switching behaviour, word-of-mouth processes in services, structural equation modelling, and tourism. His research has been published in Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Services Marketing, Journal of Service Research, Marketing Theory, Psychology and Marketing, Tourism Management, and Journal of Quality Management, and he has also presented at and published articles in the proceedings of various national and international conferences. He has been actively involved in management consulting activities with various companies over the last 8 years and is the principal of Friya Consulting, fousing primaily on management of customer relationship initiatives at various service organizations. He also currently serves as an external Senior Research Consultant for comScore Networks Inc., a Honomichl global top 25 marketing research firm, where he has worked with clients such as Microsoft, Intel, Scotia Bank, AOL, and Yahoo! among others.