Huffman Trucking Scenario

Huffman Trucking is anxious to go beyond its record of steady growth to pull ahead of its competition and CEO Phil Huffman wants to accomplish this goal through the establishment of an internal marketing culture. Internal marketing, per George and Gronroos (1989), is "the implementation of a human resource management philosophy based on a marketing perspective" (Suter, 1995, p. 1). The value of an internal marketing culture is that it increases an organization's motivation for "service-mindedness" by making employees conversant with the same issues and features that are being used to market to customers (Suter, 1995, p. 1). Internal marketing enables a company to "[take] advantage of opportunities to positively influence customer perception," recognizing that with every call that is taken and every customer that is spoken to, the company can leave the customer with a "positive impression of [its] value in business terms" (Bruno, 2007, p. 1). An internal marketing culture ensures that the entire organization, from top to bottom, becomes a tool for delivering excellent customer service. The customer and his or her satisfaction becomes the focus of the company, and the company "seeks to fulfill the needs and wants of each individual customer" (Sheth, Shisodia, & Sharma, 2000, p. 55). This customer-centric orientation is vital, as unless the company's employees have the "attitude, skills, and commitment needed to meet customer expectations and sustain customer l

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Implementing the combined solution will require four deliverables. An internal marketing training program will take six months to prepare by the training manager. Improved policies will be prepared by executive management in conjunction with employees and can be completed within four months. Market research, generic benchmarking, and customer surveys can be combined into one deliverable and prepared by the marketing manager and his team in six months. An approach for tailoring services to customer needs and preferences can be prepared by the marketing manager in two months. Evaluation of Results Mechanisms will be put in place to evaluate the results of the combined solution. To assess internal marketing culture, an employee behavior evaluation will be administered to each employee every six months, with the target being a score of at least 80/100. Customer-centric marketing will be evaluated by way of customer surveys every six months that are targeted to show at least 85% customer centricity. Uniqueness of services will be evaluated through an annual market research survey targeted at showing that no more than 2% of other companies offer the same services. Strong customer relationships will

Category: Business - H