Marketing to Win: Strategies for Building Competitive Advantage in Service Industries.

Marketing to Win: Strategies for Building Competitive Advantage in Service Industries, by Frank K. Sonnenberg, Harper & Row, 10 East 53rd Street, New York, New York 10022, 1990, 269 pp., $29.95.

Marketing services have become a hot topic. Banks, physicians, lawyers, educators, travel agencies, tour operators, plumbers and countless other serve providers have turned to marketing strategies and techniques to compete effectively in increasingly challenging environments. Accountants and accounting firms are no exception. For the accounting firm seeking to improve its marketing technique or simply trying to discover tactics that will help it become more responsive to the markets, Frank K. Sonnenberg's Marketing to Win is an excellent place to start.

The national marketing director for Ernst & Young's management consulting group, Sonnenberg has drawn on a wealth of experience as a marketing consultant to put together an eminently practical book, much of which is directly relevant to accounting services.

Key issues of concern to marketers and consultants are all here, with a decidedly service-application slant. On the subject of promotion, for example, special attention is placed on direct mail, networking, managing the sale an developing persuasive presentations. Market segmentation is treated in terms of "narrowing the field," concentrating on a specific audience and focusing the communications campaign to improve its chances for success.

Marketing concept. A key to long-run survival and prosperity is implementing a marketing concept for understanding customer needs and wants and satisfying these better than competitors-while still making a profit. To avoid just giving lip service to this, the organization must start with clearly defined missions and goals and then measure and reward performance rather than displays of political acumen. Effective communication. A service organization that cannot communicate effectively will have difficulty in marketing its services. Sonnenberg discusses how to break poor listening habits. The important role of nonverbal factors such as physical environment and spatial distance-also is discussed, as are special considerations in communicating with individuals from different cultures. Possibilities for misunderstandings abound; for example, a Japanese manager in a business meeting may say "yes" to an American but really mean "I understand you.")

Service quality. High-quality service not only helps the service provider retain current customers, but engenders positive word-of-mouth. Practical ways of improving customer service quality are provided. There are clear implications here for top management: Strong leadership plays an important role in encouraging and maintaining high service quality.

Thought-provoking ideas. Sonnenberg complements sound marketing ideas and practice with doses of personal philosophy. The last chapter compares business success to a walk on a tightrope. It provides a set of issues that can help the reader assess his or her own personal endowments, characteristics and skills and thus better maneuver along the tightrope.

Earlier chapters on successful networking and relationship management also are likely to cause many readers to reevaluate how well they perform these tasks in seeking out new clients and retaining established ones. This material is less commonly addressed in the marketing literature but, given the objective of the book (to help service companies discover ways to build competitive advantage) complements the more traditional marketing material nicely.

The book is peppered with revealing and insightful comments from noted industry leaders such as Buck Rodgers from IBM, business authors and lecturers such as Tom Peters (In Search of Excellence) and cutting-edge academic researchers in service marketing such as Leonard Berry.

In short, Marketing to Win combines a remarkable breadth of scope with an easy-to-read style that should make it a valuable and useful business reference for accountants and all other business service providers.

C. Anthony di Benedetto, PhD

assistant professor of marketing

Temple University

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania