Delivering satisfaction and service quality : a customer-based approach for libraries

Good customers expect excellent service. Increasingly, library customers are looking to online services instead of to the library for information. For every library that wants to win satisfied customers and bring those that have strayed back into the library, here are proven tools to assess needs and improve service. Hernon and Whitman, in this new companion to the volume "Assessing Service and Quality: Satisfying the Expectations of Library Customers", outline a step-by-step process to identify needs, improve service quality, evaluate customer satisfaction and implement a service plan that keeps patrons in the library. In a discipline where both quantitative and qualitative measurements are required, this new book clearly explains how to measure service delivery. Packed with practical strategies geared toward customers, this book shows how to: define and refine what services to offer; clarify the unique mission of the library; identify appropriate service goals; analyze services from the modern customer's perspective; use computer technology to lower costs and speed up results; and build long-term loyalty to the library. Ready-to-use and tested in libraries nationwide, this customer satisfaction approach is designed specifically to help librarians meet the ever-changing information needs of the modern library customer.