Zero Defects and Branding Services

Frozen North (permlink not working, look for 18 March) discusses the role of quality in the marketing of services. He is quite right to emphasize that the customer service experience is a critical component of the brand image and that service firms err if they ignore it in favor of advertising and PR.

The long-term problem is that CS quality isn't a sustainable point of differentiation. Your competitors can copy your zero-defect call center. At that point, bad service hurts your brand, but good service doesn't help: customers perceive it as par for the course.

Good service, then, is a necessary, but not sufficient factor in branding success. The firm needs something else to claim a premium position. Strategic management requires that leadership keep its eye on two goals at once: the short-term objective of zero defects and the long-term goal of being distinctive in a way that is meaningful to customers. It is a mistake to believe that the latter will flow automatically from the former.