Evaluate effectiveness of customer service activities in increasing sales for Kichi-Kichi hot pot bar restaurant on 61 Ma May street

means. Thus, restaurant business is now more competitive than ever. Thus, to get success in this hard industry, it asks for the combination of many factors and among them, customer service plays an important role. In the service sector, customer satisfaction is a decisive factor with the existence of a business. Golden Gate is a typical company in restaurant business, and customer service is its priority care. Thus, in this study on the topic “Evaluate effectiveness of customer service activities in increasing sales for Kichi-Kichi hot pot bar restaurant on 61 Ma May street” writer will focus on analyze and evaluate the effects of customer service activities used in Kichi-Kichi hot pot bar restaurant on 61 Ma May from Golden Gate from flotation up to now, and from that point of view, I will offer some proposals in order to improve customer service policy of company. To do these tasks, descriptive method will be used to collect all information, and then statistic method to analyze them. This essay will be divided into four main chapters: Chapter 1: Introduction of the company with their problem. Chapter 2: Theoretical framework Chapter 3: Analysis and Finding Chapter 4: Recommendation Because this is the first time apply marketing theory to build marketing orientation for Kichi-Kichi restaurant, essay will not avoid some mistakes. Writer is looking forward to contributions and directions so the research will be better. The writer has the honor of expressing deep gratitude to Mrs. Pham Thuc Anh who whole-heartedly gave directions. Chapter 1: Introduce Golden Gate Trade & Service Joint Stock Company and Kichi-Kichi Hot Pot Bar restaurant and their problem. 1. Company and Kichi-Kichi hotpot bar restaurant system. Name: Công ty Cổ phần Thương mại và Dịch vụ Cổng Vàng International name: Golden Gate Trade and Service Joint Stock Company. Address: floor 4, Anh Minh building, 36 Hoang Cau street, Ba Dinh district, Hanoi. Phone: 35 149 837 Fax: 37 226 755 Total staff: over 500 staffs. Company structure: List of Kichi-Kichi Hot Pot Bar restaurants in Hanoi: Name Location Foundation date Phone number Kichi-Kichi 1st floor, Big C, 222 Tran Duy Hung str., Cau Giay Dist 02/2009 04 37868424 Kichi-Kichi 1A Tang Bat Ho str., Hai Ba Trung Dist 06/2009 04 39727598 Kichi-Kichi 5th floor, Vincom city Tower, Hai Ba Trung Dist 10/2009 04 39748334 Kichi-Kichi 101-B1 Pham Ngoc Thach str., Dong Da Dist 10/2009 04 35739127 Kichi-Kichi 106 Yet Kieu str., Hai Ba Trung Dist 11/2009 04 39412321 Kichi-Kichi 40 Ton Duc Thang str., Dong Da Dist 12/2009 04 38489420 Kichi-Kichi 105 D5 Nguyen Phong Sac str. 12/2009 04 62690676 Kichi-Kichi 61 Ma May str., Hoan Kiem Dist 01/2010 04 39264958 Kichi-Kichi 241 Nguyen Trai str., Thanh Xuan Dist 02/2010 04 35578845 Kichi-Kichi 17 T4 Trung Hoa Nhan Chinh, Cau Giay Dist 03/2010 04 62510481 Kichi-Kichi 106 H1 Lang Ha str. 04/2010 List of Kichi-Kichi restaurants in Hai Phong city: Name Location Foundation time Phone number Kichi-Kichi Floor 1, 4 Nguyen Trai str., Ngo Quyen Dist 5/2009 031 3552882 List of Kichi-Kichi restaurants in Ho Chi Minh City: Name Location Foundation time Phone number Kichi-Kichi SC 3-1 Grand view, Nguyen Duc Canh str., Phu My Hung, Dist 7 07/2009 08 54119797 Kichi-Kichi 19 Phung Khac Khoan str., Dist 1 08/2009 08 38277345 Kichi-Kichi 11 Tu Xuong, Dist 3 10/2009 08 39325880 Kichi-Kichi 11 Cong Truong Me Linh, Dist 1 11/2009 08 38239997 Kichi-Kichi Lotte Mart, 5th flr, 940B 3/2 str., Ward.15, Dist 11 08 22251019 Kichi-Kichi 736-738 Dien Bien Phu str. 08 39381075 Kichi-Kichi 161-163 Calmette, Ward Nguyen Thai Binh, Dist 1 08 39153125 Kichi-Kichi 48 Nguyen Chi Thanh, Ward.2, Dist 10 08 39381085 Golden Gate Trade & Service Joint Stock Company is a foreign invested company operating and managing luxury restaurants. We are proud of our unique products, beautiful restaurants and hospitality service. Golden Gate is one of the first companies in restaurant business with its famous brand name Ashima. Ashima is a restaurant system specializing in Mushroom Hot Pot. Currently there are 7 units throughout the country centered on Ho Chi Minh and Hanoi with one unit in Haiphong. The first Ashima Restaurant opened for business on the 3rd November 2005 on 44 Phan Dinh Phung Street, Hanoi. Ashima mushroom hotpot is considered to be not only the first but also the best chain of restaurants in Vietnam specializing in mushroom hotpot. The chain now has 7 restaurants in total and can be found in all the major cities of Vietnam, such as Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi and Haiphong. Ashima mushroom hot pot was opened with the intention of bringing to the Vietnamese people a new concept of eating, combined with specialized service. This has created a “mushroom wave” in Vietnam. Ashima aims to be the number one in the restaurant business. It focuses on quality of food and service, not only in domestic, but also in foreign markets. Natural mushroom hotpot has helped Ashima to achieve the distinction of being the most professional in the food service industry. Ashima understands fully that the only way to survive and develop with one kind of product is to be the best. So far, Ashima has kept to this strategy and strongly believes that it is the right way to go. Ashima aims to be the first choice for the customer when they think of mushroom hotpot. Or we can say it slightly differently, “It is the objective of Ashima to always bring the highest quality food and service to the customer and keep an image in their mind that Ashima is always the best”. Serving more than twenty kinds of mushroom and five broth tastes, Ashima is not famous for its rich nutritional value food but also for its original service manner. The unique product and service of this new restaurant model resulted in the chain expanding to 7 restaurants in 4 years. In addition, the restaurants are invariably full, especially at weekends. That is the major reason why Ashima now is considered as the leader in the mushroom hot pot market. The Ashima system, with more than 1000 staffs in 7 restaurants currently, is the largest full scale restaurant chain in the country and also has the most impressive revenue per store in Vietnam. In 2009, company started running a new kind of drinking and service: Kichi Kichi hot pot bar with target is fast food market segmentation. With price at about USD 6 each person and the slogan “eat as much as you can”, Kichi-Kichi receives warmly welcome from urban customers. The idea of a hot pot bar came from sushi bar invention in Japan and promptly spread out to Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, etc. And the pioneer who initiated hot pot bar trend in Viet Nam is Kichi-Kichi. It’s very easy to have a meal in Kichi-Kichi. Customers just have to buy an opening-seat ticket, chose for themselves their favorite broth taste, and enjoy delectable food until full. Owning unique characteristics of both the traditional and the modern eating and drinking style, Kichi-Kichi brings to you not only a meal but a cultural space, a new style. This chain of restaurants provides customers with the variety of options for dinning out.  Instead of cooking so many dishes to satisfy every member’s demand, people now just need to go to Kichi-Kichi hot pot bar restaurant. Here, people can choose any among hundreds of dishes on non-stop moving bar that please not only who love fast food but also traditional customers. You like pork or beef, vegetable or sea food? Whatever you want, whatever you are interested in, you will be best served in Kichi-Kichi restaurant. Especially, if you have a passion with Japanese cuisine, you will pleasure with delicious sushi and other Japan food cooked by talented cooks. Sake is a favorite wine in Kichi-Kichi restaurant. In the case you are not interested in alcohol, fizzy drinks may be your choice. There are six tastes of broth consist of Thai or Sichuan, or Korea style for whom love sea food or peppery food, Japan style, mushroom broth for people whose taste is vegetable, Shabu broth is the perfect choice for any food. After dinning, you can order ice-cream or fruit for dessert. All the waiters and waitresses in Kichi-Kichi are young, sympathy, friendly, brisk, and good-mannered, and always ready to serve fellow dinners. Besides, the architecture of Kichi-Kichi restaurant is unique. Space is commodious, design is youthful. All inspire people about dynamic and creative youth. Along with clear and bright stone-tables, high seats make opulent feeling. The bars are in front of table, move with speed at twenty five dishes per minute, fast enough to not have to wait and slow enough for anyone not to miss any dish. There are red ceiling bands which are installed parallel with the moving bar. You can find a red bar above any bar. The idea of red ceiling bars is based on Eastern people; especially Vietnamese people’s conception that red is the color of luck and pleasure. These red ceiling are a symbol of good luck to customers from company. Red is also preponderant color that makes impression of a space full of vitality. Another design which is remotely related to traditional conception is rectangle mirrors covering wood walls. They are all high enough for anybody’s image not to be cut. At the same time, they cause restaurant area seems to be enlarged. Specific characteristic of Kichi-Kichi is it represents an image of young, dynamic, independent, modern, and creative. Kichi-Kichi customers initiatively make their own menu. Hot pot bar makes customers feel that they hold the initiative, taking favorite food is alike taking opportunities in life. This is an eating and drinking style of youth, a style of modern Asian – always move and ceaselessly discover. Kichi-Kichi infused a fresh spirit and diversified Vietnam eating and drinking culture. 2. Issue. From flotation, this chain of restaurant had good sales and received warmly welcome from urban customers because of it freshness. However, just after several months after opening, amount of customers go down gradually. This matter happens most seriously in Kichi-Kichi restaurant on 61 Ma May (Kichi Ma May). 3. Research questions. In this essay, researcher will focus on studying reasons caused that decrease in the aspect of customer service; and then give some proposals for sales increasing. 4. Research methodology. Research information are collected by descriptive and observation methods. All the statistics are total up from customers commend cards which were drawled to table companions in all Kichi-Kichi restaurants on Hanoi market during 2009. These cards are dispensed to customers after their meal by waiters in each restaurant and then gathered in Marketing Department each Monday. Collecting, reckoning up, comparing these figures will help me evaluate the effect of marketing strategy in customer care. Data of revenue and business cost are provided by Accounting and Marketing Departments. Researcher studied customer behavior with restaurant promotion program by observing at restaurant and supervising leaflet distribution in the road show around the Old Quarter and buildings. 5. Research scope. This research will just customer service activity applied for Kichi Ma May because I got familiar with it during my internship time. Chapter 2: Theoretical framework 1. Customer care or customer service definition. Customer service is the provision of service to customers before, during, and after a purchase. According to Jamier L. Scott (2002), “Customer service is a series of activities designed to enhance the level of customer satisfaction – that is, the feeling that a product or service has met the customer expectation." In opinion of customer A, customer service can be a high quality product with suitable price. However, customer B can consider it on-time delivery while customer C measures it through service attitude of staffs. In fact, a huge range of factors can contribute to customer satisfaction, but your customers - both consumers and other businesses - are likely to take into account: how well your product or service matches customer needs; the value for money you offer; the professionalism, friendliness and expertise of your employees; how well you keep your customers informed; and the after-sales service you provide. 2. The importance of customer service to business. Customer service is normally an integral part of a company’s customer value proposition. Every time you have contact with your customers you have an opportunity to improve your reputation with them and increase the likelihood of further sales. From the point of view of an overview sales process engineering effort, customer service plays an important role in an organization's ability to generate income and revenue. From that perspective, customer service should be included as part of an overall approach to systematic improvement. Customer often measures a business on the service that they experience both pre-sale and after-sale. Your sales and profitability depends on keeping your customers happy. Thus, the goal of customer service is customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction is what customer feels subjectively and sometimes irrationally. There is all difference between a customer ‘being satisfied’ and being ‘not dissatisfied’. Most businesses would be quite happy if their customer scored them 5 or 6 out of 7 on satisfaction. When ordering a new service or maintaining an existing service, consumers must take into account the following three key factors: the quality of the service, the price of the service, and the customer service of the service provider. The first two factors are relatively objective and usually easy to control. As shown by Figure 1, the graphical representation of a market research study done a few years ago, customer service dissatisfaction is the most important key factor when a consumer decides to change service providers. Figure 2: Reasons for Switching to another Vendor Although product or service company provides is already familiar with the market or the company is consider as the pioneer or predecessor in one business sector, it has to prioritize customer service activity. Many businesses spent millions of dollar on advertising to attract customer, they failed, however, just because they do not have any or have a poor customer service activity. Customer service plays an important part in keeping existing and making loyal customer, attracting potential customer, thenceforth helping company reduce cost and increase turnover. Keeping existing and making loyal customer Firstly, customer service is an effective tool in keeping existing and making loyal customer. Generally, customer is divided into two kinds: existing and potential customer. Retaining existing customers mean making them keep buying company product or service. Excellence in customer service, using of the idea of relationship marketing, can help your company retain customers. Relationship marketing focuses on getting customers and keeping them in longer term using a combination of marketing, quality, and customer service. It plays an important part in keeping customers. It means they are less likely to go to your competitors in the increasingly competitive markets where customers have more choices than ever. As satisfied customers, they will recommend you to other, resulting in an increase in new business. It is said that it costs up to ten times as much to win a customer than to keep an existing one. When being satisfied, they are less likely to tell other people of bad experiences. Customers experiencing poor service are likely to tell up to twenty people about their experience, which is not good advertisement for your business. This may deter other from even trying you out, and so you will not get a chance to impress them, even with the best or most innovative products and services. By focusing your attention on your customer that has the highest potential lifetime value, you can improve profitability. Your staff will have a “feel good” factor because of the environment and atmosphere that lead to happy customer. This can help to attract new customers over time. In their book Rules to Break and Laws to Follow, Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D. write that “customers have memories. They will remember you, whether you remember them or not." Further, "customer trust can be destroyed at once by a major service problem, or it can be undermined one day at a time, with a thousand small demonstrations of incompetence”. All the customers want to receive the highest attention from supplier, want their supplier considers their demand as the top priority. Only the fastest and most effective service can satisfy customers. Once companies provide an excellent customer service, they can retain their customer and make them loyal. These loyal customers help company retain a fixed income and even make more profit because when customers are pleasured, they will buy not only more but more regular. Existing customer relationships are opportunities to increase sales because your customers will already have a degree of trust in your recommendations. A study by United State Management Association shows loyal customer account for 65 percent of company total proceeds (Nguyen Thac Minh), especially in price sensitive market or market that exist similar products and service. If you currently retain 70 percent of your customers and you start a program to improve that to 80 percent, you'll add an additional 10 percent to your growth rate. The more the number of your frequent customer, the less cost you spend on advertising and marketing. Information collection is the core phase in “loyal-making” process. By studying existing customer information, you can find business opportunities, customer categories and their demand. Once having a firm grasp on hobbies, behavior of your best customers, you can build marketing campaigns aim at potential customers who have similar characteristics. In business-to-business trading, providing a high level of customer care often requires you to find out what your customers want. Once you have identified your most valuable customers or best potential customers, you can target your highest levels of customer care towards them. Another approach, particularly in the consumer market, is the obligation to treat all consumers to the highest standard. Information about your customers and what they want is available from many sources, including their order history; records of their contacts with your business such as meeting, phone call, and so on; direct feedback - if you ask them, customers will usually tell you what they want; changes in the overall success of specific products or services; feedback about your existing range - what it does and doesn't do; enquiries about possible new products or services; feedback from your customers about things they buy from other businesses; changes in the goods and services your competitors are selling; feedback and referrals from other, non-competitive suppliers. While good overall service is the best way of generating customer loyalty, sometimes new relationships can be strengthened or old ones refreshed, using customer loyalty schemes. These are programs that use fixed or percentage discounts, extra goods or prizes to reward customers for behavior that benefits your business. They can also be used to persuade customers to give you another try if you feel you have successfully tackled past problems with your customer service. You can decide to offer rewards on the basis of repeat custom, cumulative spend, orders for large quantities or with a high value, prompt payment, length of relationship. You can also provide key customers with loyalty cards that entitle them to a discount on all their purchases. Particularly because of the high cost of landing new customers versus the high profitability of a loyal customer base, you might want to reflect upon your current business strategy. These four factors will greatly affect your ability to build a loyal customer base: Products that are highly differentiated from those of the competition. Higher-end products where price is not the primary buying factor. Products with a high service component. Multiple products for the same customer. Reach Out To Your Customers! Contact . . . contact . . . contact with current customers is a good way to build their loyalty. The more the customer sees someone from your firm, the more likely you'll get the next order. Send Christmas cards, see them at trade shows, stop by to make sure everything's okay. Send a simple newsletter to your customers-tell them about the great things that are happening at your firm and include some useful information for them. Send them copies of any media clippings about your firm. Invite them to free seminars. The more they know about you, the more they see you as someone out to help them, the more they know about your accomplishments-the more loyal a customer they will be. Building customer loyalty will be a lot easier if you have a loyal workforce-not at all a given these days. It is especially important for you to retain those employees who interact with customers such as sales people, technical support, and customer-service people. Many companies give a lot of attention to retaining sales people but little to support people. I've been fortunate to have the same great people in customer service for years-and the compliments from customers make it clear that they really appreciate specific people in our service function. Employees who deal with customers' orders should be fully aware of current offers and keep customers informed. Sometimes brochures and other marketing materials are the best way of getting word out about a new customer incentive. Don't forget though that your customers' view of the overall service you provide will influence their loyalty much more than short-term rewards will. Attract new customer Loyal customers are so important to every business. However, to exist and develop in this competitive environment market, business must try its best to win new customers. The first step to attracting new customers in any economic climate is pleasing your regulars because the word-of-mouth buzz you gain from them will be a huge boon in attracting new business. Getting close to your regular customers in an economy that is tough for both of you may involve offering longer warranties and easier return policies on products, or special deals and discounts for your most valued patrons. Your customers have to bear with bad economic times just as much as you do. It is so clever to let them know you're in it together by reaching out to them and making your relationship as hassle-free as possible. Show some empathy and you'll receive it in return. Satisfactory customers will tell others about excellent service you provide that is more effective and trustworthy than anything you advertise or broadcast on public media. Next, you could reach your target groups by some direct means such as sales promotion, meeting, and free consultancy, etc. have function is to provide new customers with more information about company as well as product and service, along with gain sympathy and trust from potentials. To begin with, you have to let people know you exist – advertise yourself. If people don’t know where you are and what you do, they can’t buy from you and you will never make enough money to stay open. Advertising greatly increases your chances of success if you know who your customer is. Then you can tell them what they want to hear. However, good advertising techniques are useless without an effective message. An effective message gives people reasons to spend their money with your business. Explore various types of traditional advertising methods such as classified ads, yellow page ads, television and radio spots, and display ads in magazines and on other Web sites, go with what meets your budget and best reaches your target group. Whatever type you chose, you must make five important decisions when developing an advertising program: setting advertising objectives, budget, message, media, and finally, evaluate the result. Message decisions Message strategy Message execution Campaign evaluation Budget decisions Affordable approach Percent of sales Competitive parity Objecives and task Objective setting Communication objectives Sales objectives Communication impact Sales impact Media decisions Reach, frequency, impact Major media types Specific media vehicles Media timing Figure 3: Major advertising decisions Advertisers should set clear objectives as to whether the advertising budget is supposed to inform, persuade, or remind buyers. The advertising budget is based on what is affordable, on a percentage of sales, on competitors’ spending, or on the objectives and tasks. The message decision calls for defining reach, frequency, and impact goals; choosing major media types; selecting media vehicles and scheduling the media timing. Finally, advertising evaluation calls for measuring the communication effect and measuring the sales effects of advertising before, during, and after the advertising is placed. There are a number of free or nearly free ways to advertise your business or service. You could rely on word of mouth. Sure, that does not cost anything, but it might take a long time before word spreads. A second inexpensive method would be flyers. You could print out flyers at your local print shop and distribute them throughout your area by putting them on cars or in mailboxes. This method can be very effective for certain business, but the effect does not last long. Chances are the person will take one look and throw away the flyer. Hopefully, the flyer will be memorable enough that they remember your business' name. A third relatively inexpensive advertising method is newspaper advertisements. You could place a small ad that runs for a few weeks in a few local newspapers. This will give you great exposure to your selling area. However, the ads do not run forever unless you want to keep paying. An effective way to advertise that has a relatively low initial cost is with sales promotion. Sales promotion covers a wide variety of short-term incentive tools such as coupons, premiums, contents, buying allowances that are designed to stimulate consumers, the trade, and the company’s own sales force. Sales-promotion spending calls for setting sales-promotion objectives, selecting sales-promotion tools, developing, presenting, and implementing the sales-promotion programs, and evaluating the results. In the sales promotion strategy, promotion products are a difficult question to many businesses. What are promotional products? Promotional products are items as diverse as pens, golf balls, bags, key chains, shirts and coffee mugs that proudly display your company's name and information. Sure, the initial cost is more than using flyers or newspaper ads, but, unlike the other methods, the promotional product makes a lasting impression. Every time some uses your pen, drinks coffee from your mug or wears your polo shirt, they will immediate think of your company's name. Then when they are ready to make a purchase, your company's name is at the top of their mind. Not only are you helping people remember your company's name, but you're also giving your potential customers something they can actually use. With the right promotional product, a small business owner will see a great return on their investment. Reduce cost and increase sales Good customer service can help company reduce cost. It is true. When customers aren't happy with your business they will complain. They, however, usually won't complain to you - instead, they'll probably complain to just about everyone else they know and take their business to your competition next time. As a result, you have to find solution to solve the trouble, and that task costs your budget. On the other hand, as mentioning above, satisfactory customers easily become loyal customers, and so you will save budget for attracting new users. Customer care is a tool increases your sales promptly. Your existing customers are among the most important assets of your business - they have already chosen you instead of your competitors. Keeping their custom costs far less than attracting new business, so it's worth taking steps to make sure that they're satisfied with the service they receive. There are a number of techniques you can employ, including: providing a free customer helpline answering frequently asked questions on your website following up sales with a courtesy call providing free products that will help customers look after or make the most of their purchases sending reminders when services or check-ups are due offering preferential discounts to existing customers on further purchases Existing customer relationships are opportunities to increase sales because your customers will already have a degree of trust in your recommendations. Cross-selling and up-selling are ways of increasing either the range or the value of what you sell by pointing out new purchase possibilities to these customers. Alerting customers when new, upgraded or complimentary products become available – perhaps through regular emails or newsletters - is one way of increasing sales. To retain your customers' trust, however, never try to sell them something that clearly doesn't meet their needs. Remember, your aim is to build a solid long-term relationship with your customers rather than to make quick one-off profits. Satisfied customers will contribute to your business for years, through their purchases and through recommendations and referrals of your business. 3. Requirements on customer service. Customer se._.