UMKD6R-15-3: Alpha Robotics Customer Loss and Service Analysis

This report analyzes the case of Alpha Robotics, a UK-based firm manufacturing robots for businesses, particularly those in the food packing industry. The company expanded into service provision to enhance customer loyalty but faced customer dissatisfaction due to poor service quality. The report employs service marketing theories, including Managing People theory, Service Profit Chain Theory, and Service Quality and Satisfaction, to understand the reasons behind customer loss. It highlights issues such as inadequate customer service, lack of trained technicians, and internal communication gaps. The report recommends improvements like better employee training, 24/7 customer service, and implementing a service profit chain to enhance customer satisfaction, loyalty, and profitability. It also examines the impact of customer loss and emphasizes the importance of customer satisfaction for business success. The report concludes by suggesting strategies to retain customers and improve the overall customer experience.

Running head: ALPHA ROBOTICS AND LOSS OF CUSTOMERS
ALPHA ROBOTICS AND LOSS OF CUSTOMERS
Name of the Student
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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Discussion..................................................................................................................................3
Managing People....................................................................................................................3
Service Profit Chain Theory...................................................................................................5
Service Quality and Satisfaction............................................................................................6
Impact of Customer Loss.......................................................................................................7
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................8
Recommendation........................................................................................................................9
References................................................................................................................................11

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Introduction
Alpha Robotics is a UK based firm that manufactures robots that help other
businesses in picking and packing. The main target group of the company are the businesses
that pack food products for sale at grocery stores. To further increase their revenue and gain
more customer loyalty the firm decided to expand into servicing of the products. The
company wanted to offer the clients a complete solution, that is providing the product and
servicing it, however the customers were dissatisfied by the service. They complained that
the service was not up to the mark and that they did not like the manner in which the service
was conducted by the firm. According to Wilson et al, (2016) service can be defined as
economic activities where the output is not a physical product and is consumed at the time of
production. It provides benefit in terms of convenience that is usually intangible. Providing
service can be a competitive advantage for a firm, as it can help in distinguishing between
similar products. The main purpose of this report is understand why the company, Alpha
Robotics, lost customers and how they can use certain marketing theories that can help them
to retain customers and improve their service. Managing People theory and Service Quality
and Satisfaction theory will be used in this paper to analyse the service of Alpha Robotics.
Discussion
Managing People
It is extremely important that a company not only provides satisfaction in terms of
product, it must also provide satisfaction in terms of service that is provided by the company.
In the case of Alpha Robotics, the consumers were satisfied with the product; however, they
were displeased by the service that the company provided. The main problem that the
customers faced was that the customer service team of the company was not capable of
handling their problems, the technicians were not dedicated enough in the servicing of the

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products, and there was lack of internal communication between the staff of the company,
which created a hassle for the consumers (Huang and Wang 2014).
This problem could be solved by managing the people that are working in the
company. The service personnel that are there in a company are an integral part of the
company as they are one of the marketers of the firm; they affect the customer loyalty and the
service quality. These personnel also determine the quality of the productivity and are one of
the major source of competitive advantage for the firm (Ranjan and Read 2016). These are
the people that become a link between the customers and the company; they are the ones who
pass on the information to from one point to the other. Training these personnel can help the
company improve their customer satisfaction through service. Alpha Robotics can create a
much better service personnel workforce that can communicate the problems of the
customers to the technicians, for the customers ease and to provide the customers better
service. The company must make sure that the technicians arrive on time and have all the
parts that are required for the repairing of the product (Vafeas, Hughes and Hilton 2016). The
company must itself take up the responsibility of asking the customers when the wish to
schedule an audit for the product. The company service personnel must update their database
with the customer’s product details, for the customer to have a comfortable experience. The
right people for the job must be hired, for providing the customers more value. The
employees must be motivated to work and must be given rewards and recognitions to
improve their service quality. Rewards and recognitions are important to retain the employees
and by retaining the employees, the company can make sure that it has skilled and qualified
people that are handling the customer complaints, to provide the customers with better
service (Yoo and Arnold 2016). Taking care of the needs of the customers is vital for any
company to encourage customer loyalty through satisfaction. The main aim of the company
was to increase the customer loyalty and gain more revenue by providing incredible service

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to the customers. The company lost the consumers because of the poor quality of service that
they provided to the consumers. The consumers though did not doubt the expertise of the
staff they were not happy with the way the service was being done. The company had
introduced the service to become a competitive advantage, however as it was not
implemented in a thoughtful manner, the staff was not trained accordingly, thus there was a
gap in the expectations of the consumers and the service that was being provided to them
(Zhang, Wu and Henke 2015). The training of the staff is important as it helps the company
in providing the best possible service to the consumers. The frontline staff must always be
ready to provide the customers with any assistance that they require for the customer to feel
appreciated. One of the major problem that customers faced was that they were not
appreciated enough, this could be solved by providing 24/7 customer service helpline. The
employees must also be motivated to have intercommunication between themselves, for there
to be transparency between the customer service staff, technicians and the consumers.
Service Profit Chain Theory
The service profit chain theory that must be used by the company to increase their
profit through providing impeccable service to the consumers. The theory builds a relation
between the employee satisfaction, loyalty, productivity, customer loyalty and profitability.
The theory suggests how profit and growth is mainly due to the loyalty of the customers. The
loyalty that the consumers have is due to the satisfaction that is there because of the value
that is provided to them through the services (Hogreve et.al 2017). The value of service is
because of the employee satisfaction. The company to increase their service value chain must
have a proper system of feedback, the company though did ask for feedback it was when the
services were failing at a rapid rate. The feedback loop must have been placed by the
company to know where they were going wrong in order to improve their quality of service
before the customers dropped the service plan. The company must also have an employee

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feedback loop that can help the organisation know where they have to improve in training the
employees. Employee satisfaction is the key to having a profitable business. The company
must ensure that the service profit chain is applied to the utmost use to provide the customers
with service that is good, to increase the business profit and grow the business.
Service Quality and Satisfaction
Service quality and satisfaction can be defined as the gap between the perception of
the consumer in regards to the service offered by a company and the expectation of the firm
offering the services. There are many dimensions to provide a quality service. The company
must be reliable and dependable on delivering the promises that they have made, they must
be provide service that is impeccable and above standard, must understand the needs of the
consumers and must be willing to help the customers (Barnes et. al 2016). Satisfaction can be
termed as the fulfilment of the response of a consumer, the judgement that a consumer has,
that a product or service that they receive provides a level of consumption related fulfilment.
The satisfaction of a consumer is relative and can vary from scenario to scenario.
Providing good service to the consumers will help the company in having satisfied
consumers, which will result in loyal customers and more revenue. Providing quality service
will result in retention of the consumer. The company must improve their quality of service
and must employee more people to reduce the waiting time that the consumers have to face
when booking for an appointment. The technicians must be made aware of the problem faced
by the consumer and must be trained to be attentive of the needs of the consumers. The
technicians must inform the consumers when they are falling short of parts that are required
for the repairing of the machine and must not leave before informing the customer (Zhang,
Wu and Henke 2015). The technicians must not be in a hurry to complete the work and leave
for the next appointment; they must properly work on the complaint of customer and provide
quality service. The technicians must not be changed frequently for there to be a link

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maintained between the consumer and the technician. An old technician will be aware of the
problems that the consumer is facing and will help in providing a better service to the
consumers. Providing better service to the consumers will result in having satisfied
consumers that will result in having loyal consumers and increase in sales due to the retention
of employees. The company must make sure that the consumers are dealt with utmost priority
and that their complaint is heard and worked upon.
Any service industry must be able to provide the consumer with complete satisfaction
for them to turn into loyal customers. Retaining consumers is much cheaper than gaining new
customers are and thus, when the company provides service it must keep in mind the same,
and must provide good quality of service for the retention of consumers. The customer
satisfaction is one of the major sources that help the company in retaining a consumer. Alpha
Robotics was not able to provide satisfactory consumer service that resulted in the loss of
consumers by the company (Blut 2015). The company had hidden costs that also resulted in
the loss of the consumers. The consumers were not informed prior that the service and
maintenance fee was not included in the service contract and that they had to pay upfront for
the audits. This resulted in the consumers feeling that they were cheated upon and were
charged more for the service, thus the consumers did not want to renew the contract that they
had with the company for the servicing of the machines.
Impact of Customer Loss
Customer loss can result in the company losing the market share and gaining negative
review. It will result in loss of revenue for the company. The loss off consumer will also
become an opportunity for the competition. A loss of consumer will also result in a company
spending more to understand why the consumers are satisfied and also in gaining more
consumers (Blut 2015). The lifetime value of the consumer also takes a hit and the consumers
are not willing to deal with the company again. In the case of Alpha Robotics the consumers

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were satisfied with the machine that they were providing, however they were not satisfied by
the service that was provided by the company. This resulted in consumers not renewing their
contracts with the company and still preferring third party technicians, even when the
company was providing technicians that has manufactured the product. Losing of consumers
might also result in losing of employees, as the employees will not be satisfied with the
working environment of the company. The bad reputation of the company will also affect the
investment that the company gains from shareholders and stakeholders. The customer value
proposition of a company also drops and results in less sale of the service (Zhang, Wu and
Henke 2015). The company wanted to increase the loyalty of the customers and the sales,
however due to the bad service the company lost customers and the sales of the company
dropped. The introduction of the service program had the opposite reaction to the reaction
that the company had planned. The loss of a consumer is the biggest loss that a company can
face and it hampers the whole working system of the company.
Conclusion
In a nutshell it can be concluded from the above discussion that the loss of consumers
that the company, Alpha Robotics, faced was mainly due to the poor service that they
provided to the consumers. The company to gain more revenue in a shorter period of time
implemented the service program in a hurry. Implementing the program in a hurry resulted in
the company not being able to train the staff in appropriate ways to serve the consumers. The
frontline staff of the company was inadequate in performing their duties and thus could not
solve the customers’ complaint in a splendid manner. The staff was not able to properly and
sufficiently communicate the customers’ complaint to the technicians which slowed down the
process of providing service to the consumer. The company was careless in understanding the
needs of the consumer and working on it in an accurate manner. The company did not take
actions rapidly and waited for a long time before actually diving into understanding why the

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customers were not renewing their contracts with the consumers. The consumers though were
satisfied with the product they were displeased by the service of the company. The company
lost a lot consumers due to this which resulted in them not getting what they had expected the
outcome to be. The company had a lot of faults in the service that they were providing. There
was no proper database of a consumer which resulted in the consumer having to explain the
complaint a numerous time before their problem was actually solved. The delay in the
providing of the service and the service not meeting the expectations of the consumers also
became a cause for the loss of consumers by the company. The loss of consumers affected the
reputation of the company and thus a negative reputation of the company came into action
regarding the service that the company provided. The company also had to incur many
unexpected expenditure in order to understand why the consumers were not satisfied and also
to gain more consumers. The company also lost consumers as they did not disclose full
information and had hidden costs that were there in the contract, yet were not informed to the
consumer. This resulted in the company losing consumers due to the poor quality of service
that they provided.
Recommendation
The company could have done many things that could have helped them in retaining
the consumers. The company must not have been in a hurry to take into action the service
program, they should have trained their staff and technicians before delving into the service
sector. The company should conduct proper market research to understand the needs of the
consumers and should work according to that. The company must not have any hidden
expenses and all the terms and conditions of the contract must be informed to the consumer
prior to the consumer signing the contract. The company must also make sure that the people
that are providing the service must be adequate and responsive to the needs of the consumers.
The company must understand of the needs of the consumer to serve them better. The

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company must have policies that reward the employees; therefore, the employees serve the
consumers in a better manner.

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References
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Vafeas, M., Hughes, T., and Hilton, T. 2016 Antecedents to value diminution. Marketing
Theory. 16 (4), 469-491
Yoo, J. and Arnold, T. 2016 Frontline employee customer-oriented attitude. Journal of
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Zhang, C., Wu, F., and Henke, J.W. 2015 Leveraging boundary spanning capabilities to
encourage supplier investment: A comparative study. Industrial Marketing Management. 49
(8), 84-94.
Barnes, D., Collier, J., Howe, V., and Hoffman, D. 2016 Multiple paths to customer delight.
Journal of Services Marketing. 30 (3) 277-289.
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Hogreve, J., Iseke, A., Derfuss, K. and Eller, T., 2017. The service–profit chain: A meta-
analytic test of a comprehensive theoretical framework. Journal of Marketing, 81(3), pp.41-
61.

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