Manage the Customer Mix: Because customers frequently interact with each other in the process of service delivery and consumption, another important strategic objective is the effective management of the mix of customers who simultaneously experience the service. If a restaurant chooses to serve two segments during the dinner hour that are incompatible with each other for e.g. single college students who want to party and families with small children who want quite it may find that the two groups do not merge well. Of course it is possible to manage these segments so that they do not interact with each other by seating them in different sections or by attracting the two segments at different times a day.
The process of managing multiple and sometimes conflicting segments is known as compatibility Segment broadly defined as “a process of first attracting homogeneous consumers to the service Environment and customer to customer encounters in such a way as to enhance satisfying encounters and minimize dissatisfying encounters.
To manage multiple segments organizations rely on a variety of strategies. Attracting maximally homogeneous group of customers through careful positioning and segmentation strategies is one approach. This is the strategy used Ritz Carlton Hotel Company.
Other strategies for enhancing customer compatibility include customer “codes of conduct” such as the regulation of smoking behaviour and dress codes. Clearly such code of conduct may vary from one service establishment to another. Finally training employees to observe customer-to-customer interactions and to be sensitive to potential conflicts is another strategy for increasing compatibility among segments.
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