Helen Strong

MSc English Language Teaching Management

Marketing in ELT

The question

Compare, in detail, the products of three language schools, with respect to the service component, suggesting ways in which the latter could be enhanced. According to many experts, service, quality and price may be traded off against one another - to offer a greater level of service requires higher costs, hence, higher prices. In a detailed analysis, explain: to what extent you think your students or clients would value certain services; what trade-offs could be made in your language school or other language schools you are familiar with; and, how emphasis upon the service dimension might be used to segment the market.

The extract

Language teaching is an intangible product. In comparison with tangible goods, such as cars, electronics, or white goods, the customer cannot physically see the qualities, characteristics and value for money of language services. This makes it all the more difficult for language service providers to develop USPs*, and it is therefore extremely important for language institutions to build a reputation for excellence in all the services offered.

One way of developing a USP is to make use of standardisation. This will be discussed later in relation to the inlingua school. An alternative method is to use differentiation, in which specific market segments are targeted. This method, adopted by Audi Akademie, a training institution based in southern Germany, will also be explored further.

This paper is in two parts. The first part will begin by describing the services provided by three language schools delivering training in Ingolstadt, a town in southern Germany. These services will then be compared with one another from the perspectives of target market and course content, and suggestions proposed as to how the service component in one of the schools could be enhanced.

The second part of the paper is concerned with customer perceptions of value, with some of the perceived benefits of language training in the customer's eyes being identified. Since higher quality generally means a higher price, suggestions will be made as to what service components could be sacrificed. Finally, the paper will look at how a school can concentrate on specific service components to segment the market and therefore secure market share.

*Unique Selling Propositions. These are characteristics of a product or service which differentiate it from its competitors' products.

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