A SIP PROJECT REPORT

ON

“A STUDY ON CUSTOMER SATISFACTON LEVEL AT ASHOK

TRADERS”

SUBMITTED TO

SAVITRIBAI PHULE PUNE UNIVERSITY, PUNE

IN THE PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF TWO YEARS FULL TIME

MASTERS DEGREE IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION (MBA)

SUBMITTED BY

Ms. ASWATHY PANICKAR

(BATCH -2021-2023)

UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF

PROF. NIJI SHAJAN

THROUGH

KES’S

PRATIBHA INSTITUTE OF BUSINESS MANAGEMENT CHINCHWAD

411019

1
 DECLARATION

I hereby declare that the Project titled “A study on Customer Satisfaction level
at Ashok Traders” is an original piece of Research Work carried out by me
under the guidance and supervision of Prof. Niji Shajan.
The information has been collected from genuine and authentic sources.
The project is submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirement of “Master
of Business Administration” to Savitribai Phule Pune University.

Place: Chinchwad, Pune

Date: Ms. Aswathy Panickar

2
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

It is a great opportunity for me to express my profound gratitude towards all the

individuals who directly or indirectly contributed towards the completion of this
report.

Working on this report was a great fun, excitement, challenges and a new
exposure in the field of Marketing & Sales.

This project would not have been completed without the guidance and support
of my project guide Prof. Niji Shajan. It is by virtue of her valuable suggestions
and mentoring that this project has materialized into concrete form.

I am deeply indebted to Mr. R.P.Jain, Proprietor, for helping me out with all
resources needed to prepare this report.

I am very much thankful to the Sales and Marketing Department of Ashok

Traders, they have provided me with much needed information and other required
assistance in order to prepare this report.

Aswathy Panickar
MBA (2021–22)
PIBM, Pune

3
 Pratibha Institute of Business Management
Chinchwad, Pune
Department of MBA
AY 2022-23
Project Outline Report for Summer Internship Project

o Name of the student - Aswathy Anirudhan Panickar

o Trainee Organization -

Name – Ashok Traders Pvt. Ltd.

Address – Near Chaphekar Chowk, Chinchwadgaon, Pune – 411033.
Email – ashoktraders1980@hotmail.com
Tele – 020 – 27357341, 27347342
o Internal Company Guide -

Name - Mr. R.P. Jain

Designation – Proprietor
Email – ramanjain57@gmail.com
Contact No. - +91 9325444470

o Beginning date of the Project – 21/11/2022

o Completion (Projected) date of Project – 04/02/2023

o Specialization – Finance

o Title of the project – A Study on Customer Satisfaction Level at Ashok

Traders

4
 Index
Chapter Title

Executive summary 6–7

1 Introduction 8 – 13

 Outline of the Problem

 Objective, Scope & Limitation of the study.

2  Industry Profile 14 - 16

3  Company Profile and Product Profile 17- 21

4 Theoretical background 22 - 30

5 Literature Review 31 - 33

6 Research Methodology 34 - 37

7 Data analysis and interpretation 38 - 51

8  Findings & Observations 52 – 55

 Suggestions

9 Learning through the project. 56 – 57

10 Contribution to the host organization. 58 – 59

11 Conclusion of the project. 60 – 61

Bibliography 62 – 63

Annexure: 64 – 68

a) Questionnaire
b) Any other relevant attachments

5
Executive Summary

6
Internship is such a program which enables a student experience the corporate
life. I was assigned as intern under Sales department. I did my report on “A study
of Customer Satisfaction Level at Ashok Trades”
Every organization exists with a motive to earn profit. To earn profit and to
achieve its objectives, every organization requires proper sales management.
The entire project talks about concept of sales management.
This report is prepared on the basis of my two-months practical experience at
Ashok Trades Pvt. Ltd. This internship program helped me to learn mainly about
customer satisfaction impact on overall Sales department.

7
Chapter 1.
Introduction

8
Introduction to Customer Satisfaction

 Business always starts and closes with customers and hence the customers
must be treated as the King of the market. All the business enhancements,
profit, status, image etc of the organization depends on customers. Hence it is
important for all the organizations to meet all the customers’ expectations and
identify that they are satisfied customer.
 Customer satisfaction is the measure of how the needs and responses are
collaborated and delivered to excel customer expectation. It can only be
attained if the customer has an overall good relationship with the supplier. In
today’s competitive business marketplace, customer satisfaction is an
important performance exponent and basic differentiator of business strategies.
Hence, the more is customer satisfaction; more is the business and the bonding
with customer.
 Customer satisfaction is a part of customer’s experience that exposes a
supplier’s behavior on customer’s expectation. It also depends on how
efficiently it is managed and how promptly services are provided. This
satisfaction could be related to various business aspects like marketing, product
manufacturing, engineering, quality of products and services, responses
customer’s problems and queries, completion of project, post delivery services,
complaint management etc.
 Customer satisfaction is the overall essence of the impression about the
supplier by the customers. This impression which a customer makes regarding
supplier is the sum total of all the process he goes through, right from
communicating supplier before doing any marketing to post delivery options
and services and managing queries or complaints post delivery. During this
process the customer comes across working environment of various
departments and the type of strategies involved in the organization. This helps
the customer to make strong opinion about the supplier which finally results in
satisfaction or dissatisfaction.
 Customer’s perception on supplier helps the customer choose among the
supplier on basis of money value and how well the delivered products suit all
the requirements. The supplier’s services never diminishes after the delivery as
customer seeks high values post marketing services which could help them use
and customize the delivered product more efficiently. If he is satisfied with the
post marketing services then there are good chances for supplier to retain the
customers to enhance repeated purchases and make good business profits.
 It is necessarily required for an organization to interact and communicate with
customers on a regular basis to increase customer satisfaction. In these
interactions and communications it is required to learn and determine all
individual customer needs and respond accordingly. Even if the products are
identical in competing markets, satisfaction provides high retention rates. For
example, shoppers and retailers are engaged with frequent shopping and credit
cards to gain customer satisfaction, many high end retailers also provide
membership cards and discount benefits on those cards so that the customer
remain loyal to them.

9
 Higher the satisfaction level, higher is the sentimental attachment of customers
with the specific brand of product and also with the supplier. This helps in
making a strong and healthy customer-supplier bonding. This bonding forces
the customer to be tied up with that particular supplier and chances of defection
very less. Hence customer satisfaction is very important panorama that every
supplier should focus on to establish a renounced position in the global market
and enhance business and profit.
 Managing customers’ satisfaction efficiently is one the biggest challenge an
organization face.
 The tools or methods to measure customer satisfaction needs to be defined
sophisticatedly to fulfill the desired norms.

 There are following methods to measure customer satisfaction:

 Direct Methods

 Directly contacting customers and getting their valuable feedback is very

important. Following are some of the ways by which customers could be directly
tabbed:
 Getting customer feedback through third party agencies.
 Direct marketing, in-house call centers, complaint handling department could
be treated as first point of contact for getting customer feedback. These
feedbacks are compiled to analyze customers’ perception.
 Getting customer feedback through face to face conversation or meeting.
 Feedback through complaint or appreciation letter.
 Direct customer feedback through surveys and questionnaires.
 Organizations mostly employ external agencies to listen to their customers and
provide dedicated feedback to them. These feedbacks needs to be
sophisticated and in structured format so that conclusive results could be
fetched out. Face to face meetings and complaint or appreciation letter engages
immediate issues. The feedback received in this is not uniformed as different
types of customers are addressed with different domains of questions. This
hiders the analysis process to be performed accurately and consistently.
 Hence the best way is to implement a proper survey which consists of
uniformed questionnaire to get customer feedback from well segmented
customers. The design of the prepared questionnaire is an important aspect
and should enclose all the essential factors of business. The questions asked
should be in a way that the customer is encouraged to respond in a obvious
way. These feedback could received by the organizations can be treated as
one of the best way to measure customer satisfaction.
 Apart from the above methods there is another very popular direct method
which is surprise market visit. By this, information regarding different segment
of products and services provided to the customers could be obtained in an
efficient manner. It becomes easy for the supplier to know the weak and strong
aspects of products and services.

 Indirect Method

 The major drawback of direct methods is that it turns out to be very costly and
requires a lot of pre compiled preparations to implement. For getting the

10
 valuable feedbacks the supplier totally depends on the customer due to which
they looses options and chances to take corrective measure at correct time.
Hence there are other following indirect methods of getting feedback regarding
customer satisfaction.

 Customer Complaints

 Customer’s complaints are the issues and problems reported by the customer
to supplier with regards to any specific product or related service. These
complaints can be classified under different segments according to the severity
and department. If the complaints under a particular segment go high in a
specific period of time then the performance of the organization is degrading in
that specific area or segment. But if the complaints diminish in a specific period
of time then that means the organization is performing well and customer
satisfaction level is also higher.

 Customer Loyalty

 It is necessarily required for an organization to interact and communicate with

customers on a regular basis to increase customer loyalty. In these interactions
and communications it is required to learn and determine all individual customer
needs and respond accordingly. A customer is said to be loyal if he revisits
supplier on regular basis for purchases. These loyal customers are the satisfied
ones and hence they are bounded with a relationship with the supplier. Hence
by obtaining the customer loyalty index, suppliers can indirectly measure
customer satisfaction.

11
Outline of the Problem

Every organization’s goal is to earn profit, to achieve this organizational goal, an

organization needs to take of certain factors. An organization should ensure that
appropriate steps are taken to achieve its goals.
While working at Ashok Traders, I observed the following problems:
1) The performance of the sales workers was not up to mark to increase
sales volume.
2) The sales workers had less awareness about the distribution process.
3) The employees and customers lacked communication skills.
4) Customers were not satisfied with price of the product.
5) The company was not achieving its desired goals.

Objectives of the study

 To study and understand customer satisfaction level.

 To study and understand how to improve distribution.
 To study and understand whether company is meeting customer expectation.

12
Scope of the study

This project would help to focus on customer satisfaction level after using products
from the company. It would help to study how sales can be improved benefitting
towards company’s profit. This study would help to understand product distribution and
managing sales to achieve organizational objectives.

Limitation of the study

 The time frame utilized for this project was limited.

 Organizational data required for this study was confidential, which if provided,
would have enabled a much better understanding.
 While getting the questionnaires filled, most of the customers didn’t want to fill
due to limitation of time and lack of knowledge. I faced a lot of concerns while
convincing them to fill up the questionnaires.

13
 Chapter 2.
Industry Profile

14
Trading And Distribution Sector

The industrial trading and distribution market is becoming more dynamic than ever. G
lobal disruptions like the pandemic, climate change, and trade relations are affecting t
his industry to its core. Distribution companies are adapting to new business models
due to increasing demands, diminishing margins, and tough competition. Successful
distribution companies are gaining greater value from the value chain by integrating c
hannels through self–service ordering and aggregated sourcing of suppliers.

Distribution companies are facing numerous challenges, such as rising quality servic
e expectations, supply chain directly linked to monetization, and dispersed market se
gments with different pricing structures.

In all countries, distribution represents a large share of domestic economic activity and
employment. The sector is highly dynamic and changing rapidly, with a trend towards
the rapid development of new forms of supply — for example, through electronic
commerce.
The distribution sector provides the necessary link between producers and
consumers, within and across borders. The efficiency of the sector is crucial to
ensuring that consumers have extensive access to a wide variety of goods at
competitive prices.
Distribution services include wholesale trade services, retailing services, franchising
and commission agents' services. The sector is diverse, covering various formats
(fixed location stores, electronic commerce, door-to-door sales, markets etc.), outlets
(hypermarkets, supermarkets, department stores, convenience stores, small shops),
product offerings (food vs. non-food, multi-product vs. specialized goods, etc.) and
legal structures (e.g. independent, integrated groups, franchises).

Marketing and Distribution Channel

The analysis covers diligent reviews on the company’s marketing policy, and strategy
, in an effort to attract customers and provide good services for the customers. Numb
er of distribution network and other supporting facilities in strategic locations in order t
o come closer to customers, and the company’s market expansion strategy (aggressi
ve vs. conservative) are also incorporated in the rating consideration. The assessme
nts toward ability to maintain a good relationship both with its customers and brand’s
principals is also highly considered in rating determination.

15
Diversification

The analysis includes risk assessments on the company’s diversification strategy and
policy in terms of products, target customers and geographic coverage in an effort to
maintain steady revenue stream. In general, excellent strategy of product mix/mercha
ndise assortments are important factors to fulfill its target market’s necessities.

Operating Management

The analysis includes thorough reviews on how well the company manages its daily b
usiness operation, as a failure to effectively and efficiently manage the operation wou
ld adversely affect the company’s future operating results. The company’s cost contr
ol strategy and policy is also diligently assessed, as the company’s strong ability to c
ontrol costs is crucial, particularly in the fiercer competition business environment. Th
e company’s inventory strategy and policy is also analyzed, as a good inventory man
agement will minimize slow moving and/or obsolete inventory so that there will be low
er inventory costs, thus lead to lower and competitive merchandise prices. The use o
f information technology especially in inventory management to monitor flow of goods
in order to have more efficient operation in terms of time and cost and the company’s
purchasing power with respect to suppliers are also incorporated in the rating consid
eration. Generally, larger players have competitive advantages, as they have stronge
r bargaining power and economies of scale in transportation, logistics, purchasing an
d advertising. The analysis on operating margins (EBIT and EBITDA) is also assesse
d by comparing the company’s ratios with other players in the same industry or other
industry with similar characteristic, which is important in analyzing the company’s co
mpetitiveness. The analysis is helpful to measure operating efficiency.

16
 Chapter 3.
Company Profile

17
Ashok Traders’ is one of the prominent business entities engaged in distribution, tra
ding and supplying moor pumps and starters "Ashok Traders was establishment in ye
ar 1980 by Shri. Ramanlal P Jain, who envisioned a success story started from the A
griculture Business in 1980, Ashok Traders has grown swiftly into Industrial sector, to
day Ashok Traders become one of Pune's largest dealer/distributor of Kirloskar Broth
er Ltd, Godrej Lawkim Motors, having presence across sectors like Industries, Reside
ntial and Commercial buildings, Irrigation, Municipal water supply, Firefighting, Speci
al Application Pumps, Water treatment plants, Domestic Pumps etc. Shri. R.P Jain st
arted with small retail counter in PCMC. Over the years, they have continuously expa
nded the services to all over customers in Maharashtra." Ashok Traders has made a
name for itself in the list of top suppliers of in India. The supplier company is located i
n Chinchwad, Maharashtra and is one of the leading sellers of listed products. Ashok
Traders is listed in Trade India's list of verified sellers offering supreme quality of etc.

18
Product Profile

19
 1) Kirloskar Pumps

 KBL created the world's largest irrigation project at the time (March 2007).
This was the Narmada Project implemented on behalf of the Gujarat
Government.
 Kirloskar Brothers has been closely associated with India's nuclear
program and has made canned motor pumps for pumping heavy
water which are deployed at Indian Nuclear Power Plants.
 KBL is also the first Indian company to get Factory Mutual certification for
its valves.
 Kirloskar Brothers has a presence in over 80 countries.
 Kirloskar Brothers Ltd is one of the oldest companies in India and was the
first engineering company in India to sell products under an Indian brand in
the late 1880s.

2) Khyatee Starters

Khyatee is a registered SSI started in 1995 at Pune, it has carved a niche for itself in
areas of pumps, control panels and starters.

3) Crompton Pumps

 Crompton Corporation, is a chemical manufacturer.

 Crompton Parkinson, British manufacturer of electrical motors, control gear
and lamp bulbs.

4) Lubi Pumps

When it comes to the science of pumping, Lubi pumps present smart, sturdy and
sustainable pumping solutions with over 50 years of unmatchable experience and
expertise for applications in Industries across the spectrum.

20
Core Values

 Customer Satisfaction: The company is dedicated to build a healthy

relationship with customers by becoming partners in fulfilling their mission.
 Focus on quality: The company strives to deliver services with high quality to
the customers at promised time schedule.
 Collective Responsibility: The employees of the company work together as a
family to achieve the collective objective.

21
 Chapter 4.
Theoretical Background

22
 Customer satisfaction (often abbreviated as CSAT) is a term frequently used
in marketing. It is a measure of how products and services supplied by a company
meet or surpass customer expectation. Customer satisfaction is defined as "the
number of customers, or percentage of total customers, whose reported
experience with a firm, its products, or its services (ratings) exceeds
specified satisfaction goals. Customers play an important role and are essential in
keeping a product or service relevant; it is, therefore, in the best interest of the
business to ensure customer satisfaction and build customer loyalty.
 Business always starts and closes with customers and hence the customers must
be treated as the King of the market. All the business enhancements, profit, status,
image etc of the organization depends on customers. Hence it is important for all
the organizations to meet all the customers’ expectations and identify that they are
satisfied customer.
 Customer satisfaction is the measure of how the needs and responses are
collaborated and delivered to excel customer expectation. It can only be attained if
the customer has an overall good relationship with the supplier. In today’s
competitive business marketplace, customer satisfaction is an important
performance exponent and basic differentiator of business strategies. Hence, the
more is customer satisfaction; more is the business and the bonding with customer.
 Customer satisfaction is a part of customer’s experience that exposes a supplier’s
behaviour on customer’s expectation. It also depends on how efficiently it is
managed and how promptly services are provided. This satisfaction could be
related to various business aspects like marketing, product manufacturing,
engineering, quality of products and services, responses customer’s problems and
queries, completion of project, post delivery services, complaint management etc.
 Customer satisfaction is the overall essence of the impression about the supplier
by the customers. This impression which a customer makes regarding supplier is
the sum total of all the process he goes through, right from communicating supplier
before doing any marketing to post delivery options and services and managing
queries or complaints post delivery. During this process the customer comes
across working environment of various departments and the type of strategies
involved in the organization. This helps the customer to make strong opinion about
the supplier which finally results in satisfaction or dissatisfaction.
 Customer’s perception on supplier helps the customer choose among the supplier
on basis of money value and how well the delivered products suit all the
requirements. The supplier’s services never diminish after the delivery as customer
seeks high values post marketing services which could help them use and
customize the delivered product more efficiently. If he is satisfied with the post
marketing services then there are good chances for supplier to retain the
customers to enhance repeated purchases and make good business profits.
 It is necessarily required for an organization to interact and communicate with
customers on a regular basis to increase customer satisfaction. In these
interactions and communications, it is required to learn and determine all individual
customer needs and respond accordingly. Even if the products are identical in
competing markets, satisfaction provides high retention rates. For example,
shoppers and retailers are engaged with frequent shopping and credit cards to gain
customer satisfaction, many high-end retailers also provide membership cards and
discount benefits on those cards so that the customer remain loyal to them.

23
 Higher the satisfaction level, higher is the sentimental attachment of customers
with the specific brand of product and also with the supplier. This helps in making
a strong and healthy customer-supplier bonding. This bonding forces the customer
to be tied up with that particular supplier and chances of defection very less. Hence
customer satisfaction is very important panorama that every supplier should focus
on to establish a renounced position in the global market and enhance business
and profit.
 The Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB) endorses the definitions,
purposes, and measures that appear in Marketing Metrics as part of its ongoing
Common Language in Marketing Project. In a survey of nearly 200 senior
marketing managers, 71 percent responded that they found a customer satisfaction
metric very useful in managing and monitoring their businesses. Customer
satisfaction is viewed as a key performance indicator within business and is often
part of a Balanced Scorecard. In a competitive marketplace where businesses
compete for customers, customer satisfaction is seen as a major differentiator and
increasingly has become an important element of business strategy.
 Customer satisfaction provides a leading indicator of consumer purchase
intentions and loyalty. The authors also wrote that "customer satisfaction data are
among the most frequently collected indicators of market perceptions. Their
principal use is twofold:"

 "Within organizations, the collection, analysis and dissemination of

these data send a message about the importance of tending to
customers and ensuring that they have a positive experience with the
company's goods and services."
 "Although sales or market share can indicate how well a firm is
performing currently, satisfaction is perhaps the best indicator of how
likely it is that the firm’s customers will make further purchases in the
future. Much research has focused on the relationship between
customer satisfaction and retention. Studies indicate that the
ramifications of satisfaction are most strongly realized at the extremes.

Customer Satisfaction Strategies

 If customer satisfaction can be defined as the feeling a person experiences when

an offering meets his or her expectations, then there are two critical ways to
improve customer satisfaction. The first is to establish appropriate expectations in
the minds of customers. The second is to deliver on those expectations.

 Establishing appropriate expectations in the minds customers is a function of the

prepurchase communications the seller has with them. A common saying in
business is “under promise and overdeliver.” In other words, set consumers’
expectations a bit low, and then exceed those expectations in order to create
delighted customers who are enthusiastic about your product. A seller hopes that
enthusiastic customers will tell their friends about the seller’s offering, spreading
lots of positive word of mouth about it.

24
 One customer satisfaction strategy that grew out of Carlson’s idea of delighting
customers is to empower customer-facing personnel. Customer-facing personnel
are employees that meet and interact with customers. In a hotel, this might include
desk clerks, housekeepers, bellman, and other staff. Empowering these
employees to drop what they’re doing in order to do something special for a
customer, for example, can certainly delight customers. In some organizations,
employees are even given a budget for such activities.

 Companies like Ritz-Carlton also monitor Twitter and other social media so that
any problems can be identified in real time. For example, one newlywed tweeted
that the view outside her window of another wall was no way to spend a
honeymoon. A Ritz-Carlton employee caught the tweet and employees at the hotel
responded with a room upgrade.

 Empowerment is more than simply a budget and a job description—frontline

employees also need customer skills. Companies like Ritz-Carlton and Sewell
spend a great deal of time and effort to ensure that employees with customer
contact responsibilities are trained and prepared to handle small and large
challenges with equal aplomb.

 Another customer satisfaction strategy involves offering customers warranties and

guarantees. Warranties serve as an agreement that the product will perform as
promised or some form of restitution will be made to the customer. Customers who
are risk-averse find warranties reassuring.

Measuring Customer Satisfaction

Effective customer satisfaction measures have several components. The two general
components are the customer’s expectations and whether the organization performed
well enough to meet them. A third component is the degree of satisfaction, or to put it
in terms to have used to describe exceptional performance, is the customer delighted?

To figure out if a customer’s expectations were met and they are delighted, more detail
is usually required. Companies might break the offering into major components and
ask how satisfied customers were with each.

Handling the Complaint Process

A good customer complaint handling process involves the steps listed below. Note
that one step is to acknowledge the customer’s feelings. A customer who is angry or
upset due to a failure does not want to be patronized or have his or her problems taken
lightly. The situation is important to the customer and should be important to the person
listening and responding to the complaint.

 Listen carefully to the complaint

 Acknowledge the customer’s feelings
 Determine the root cause of the problem
 Offer a solution
25
  Gain agreement on the solution and communicate the process of resolution
 Follow up, if appropriate
 Record the complaint and resolution

Note that the complaint-resolution process involves communicating that process and
gaining agreement on a solution, even if the customer sometimes might not like the
outcome. He or she still needs to know what to expect.

Finally, the complaint process includes recording the complaint. The firm’s best
strategy is to perform at or beyond the customer’s expectations so as to minimize the
number of complaints it receives in the first place. Analysing company’s complaints
can help identify weak points in a service process or design flaws in a product, as well
as potential miscommunications that are raising customer’ expectations unreasonably.
To conduct this analysis, however, you need a complete record of the complaints
made.

A complaint record should reflect the main reason an offering failed. Typically, the
failure can be attributed to one (or more) of the following four gaps (Levy & Weitz,
2009):

 The communication gap. Overstating the offering’s performance level, thereby

creating unrealistic expectations on the part of customers.
 The knowledge gap. Not understanding the customer’s expectations or needs,
which then leads a company to create a product that disappoints the customer.
 The standards gap. Setting performance standards that are too low despite
what is known about the customers’ requirements.
 The delivery gap. Failing to meet the performance standards established for an
offering.

3 C’s of Customer Satisfaction

Consistency, Consistency & Consistency

 Sustaining an audience is hard,” Bruce Springsteen once said. “It

demands a consistency of thought, of purpose, and of action over a long
period of time.” He was talking about his route to music stardom, yet his
words are just as applicable to the world of customer experience.
Consistency may be one of the least inspirational topics for most managers.
But it’s exceptionally powerful, especially at a time when retail channels are
proliferating and consumer choice and empowerment are increasing.
 Getting consistency right also requires the attention of top leadership. That’s
because by using a variety of channels and triggering more and more
interactions with companies as they seek to meet discrete needs, customers
create clusters of interactions that make their individual interactions less
important than their cumulative experience. This customer journey can span

26
 all elements of a company and include everything from buying a product to
actually using it, having issues with a product that require resolution, or
simply making the decision to use a service or product for the first time.
 It’s not enough to make customers happy with each individual interaction.
One recent customer-experience survey of some 27,000 American
consumers across 14 different industries found that effective customer
journeys are more important: measuring satisfaction on customer journeys
is 30 percent more predictive of overall customer satisfaction than
measuring happiness for each individual interaction. In addition, maximizing
satisfaction with customer journeys has the potential not only to increase
customer satisfaction by 20 percent but also to lift revenue by up to 15
percent while lowering the cost of serving customers by as much as 20
percent.

Three keys to Consistency

1. Customer-journey consistency

 It’s well understood that companies must continually work to provide

customers with superior service, with each area of the business having clear
policies, rules, and supporting mechanisms to ensure consistency during
each interaction. However, few companies can deliver consistently across
customer journeys, even in meeting basic needs.
 Simple math illustrates why this is so important in a world of increasingly
multichannel, multitouch customer journeys. Assume a customer interacts
six times with a pay-tv company, starting when he or she undertakes online
research into providers and ending when the first bill is received 30 days
after service is installed. Assuming a 95 percent satisfaction rate for each
individual interaction—whether measuring responsiveness, the accuracy of
information, or other factors—even this level of performance means that up
to one in four customers will have a poor experience during the on-boarding
journey.
 The fact is that consistency on the most common customer journeys is an
important predictor of overall customer experience and loyalty. Banks, for
example, saw an exceptionally strong correlation between consistency on
key customer journeys and overall performance in customer experience.
And when we sent an undercover-shopping team to visit 50 bank branches
and contact 50 bank call centres, the analysis was confirmed: for lower-
performing banks, the variability in experience was much higher among a
typical bank’s branches than it was among different banks themselves.
Large banks typically faced the greatest challenge.

2. Emotional consistency

 One of the most illuminating results of one of the survey was that positive
customer-experience emotions—encompassed in a feeling of trust—were the
biggest drivers of satisfaction and loyalty in a majority of industries surveyed.
 What is also striking is how valuable the consistency-driven emotional
connection is for customer loyalty. For bank customers, “a brand I feel close to”

27
 and “a brand that I can trust” were the top drivers for bank differentiation on
customer experience. In a world where research suggests that fewer than 30
percent of customers trust most major financial brands, ensuring consistency
on customer journeys to build trust is important for long-term growth.

3. Communication consistency

 A company’s brand is driven by more than the combination of promises made

and promises kept. What’s also critical is ensuring customers recognize the
delivery of those promises, which requires proactively shaping communications
and key messages that consistently highlight delivery as well as themes.
Southwest Airlines, for example, has built customer trust over a long period by
consistently delivering on its promise as a no-frills, low-cost airline. Similarly,
Progressive Insurance created an impression among customers that it offered
lower rates than its competitors in the period from 1995 to 2005 and made sure
to highlight when it delivered on that promise. Progressive also shaped how
customers interpreted cost-reduction actions such as on-site resolution of auto
claims by positioning and reinforcing these actions as part of a consistent brand
promise that it was a responsive, technology-savvy company. In both cases,
customer perceptions of the brands reinforced operational realities. Such
brands generate a reservoir of goodwill and remain resilient on the basis of their
consistency over time in fulfilling promises and their strong, ongoing marketing
communications to reinforce those experiences.
 Becoming a company that delivers customer-journey excellence requires many
things to be done well. But we’ve found that there are three priorities. First, take
a journey-based approach. For companies wanting to improve the customer
experience as a means of increasing revenue and reducing costs, executing on
customer journeys leads to the best outcomes. We found that a company’s
performance on journeys is 35 percent more predictive of customer satisfaction
and 32 percent more predictive of customer churn than performance on
individual touchpoints. Since a customer journey often touches different parts
of the organization, companies need to rewire themselves to create teams that
are responsible for the end-to-end customer journey across functions. While we
know there are an infinite number of journeys, there are generally three to five
that matter most to the customer and the business—start your improvements
there. To track progress, effectiveness, and predict opportunities, you may
need to retool both metrics and analytics to report on journeys, not just
touchpoint insights.
 Second, fix areas where negative experiences are common. Because a single
negative experience has four to five times greater relative impact than a positive
one, companies should focus on reducing poor customer experiences,
especially in those areas in which customers come into contact with the
organization most often. For instance, training frontline service representatives
to identify and address specific customer issues through role playing and script
guidelines will go a long way toward engendering deeper customer trust.
 Customers are valuing an “average” experience less and have even less
patience for variability in delivery. In addition, companies that experience
inconsistency challenges often expend unnecessary resources without actually
improving the customer journey. Making additional investments to improve the

28
 customer experience without tightening the consistency of experience is just
throwing good money after bad.

Customer Satisfaction at Ashok Traders

Customers form the most important part of the business and hence businesses always
try to increase customer satisfaction. It is the key to a loyal customer base and a
successful business. They are great advocates of your brand, give you repeat
business, and genuinely want you to succeed in the market. Without satisfied
customers, you will not have loyal customers. Without customer loyalty, you may not
have customers that stay long. They will switch to your competitors or the next best
option as and when they get the chance. Customer satisfaction and loyalty saves you
money; it is 7x costlier to acquire new customers than retain old ones.

Customer Satisfaction Process

Define Goals & Metrics

The core customer experience metric should be quantitative either expressed in
numbers or answers to a close ended question. It will make tracking changes over
time much easier and reliable. Open ended questions are useful for digging deeper
into customers opinions and collecting valuable insights.

Create a Customer Satisfaction Survey

Once the channel is chosen, its time to create effective customer satisfaction survey
and implementing the right customer satisfaction software. New customers and
returning customers are questioned differently when researching customer
satisfaction.

Collect Answers
Collecting answers from customers makes things understandable. Its difficult to talk
about minimum sample size because it often depends on the number of customers
you survey.

Analyse Results
Analyzing the results makes the key part of the customer satisfaction process. Only
good analysis let find out how satisfied customers are. Open ended questions would
quickly make sense of collected answers.

29
Turn Customer Feedback in Action
When improvements are implemented, its time to move on to the last point of the
customer satisfaction process.

Survey Again
Growing customer satisfaction is a never ending process. Once customer feedback
survey is already implemented, runs another customer survey after a while to see if
they worked.

Conclusion
The described process ensures customer satisfaction in depth and be able to increase
it over time.

30
 Chapter 5.
Literature Review

31
 According to Zairi (2000), A research on customer satisfaction level, the feeling
of pleasure and expectation fulfillment is known as Satisfaction. If the product
cannot satisfy customer feelings they will be dissatisfied, and if product satisfies
them after the use customer will be satisfied and become loyal to that product or
brand. In other words, customer satisfaction is about those goods or services which
fulfil the customer expectation in terms of quality and service for which he has paid.
If Customer satisfaction develops, they will become loyal to that product or brand
and their loyalty will be good for the company in sense as a Profit. Customer
satisfaction is the part of marketing and play important role in the market. In any
organization satisfaction of customer is more important, because if your customer
is satisfied with your services or products, your position will be good in the market.

 Kurniawan (2010), customer satisfaction can change over the period of time; it is
a dynamic process. The individual perception about the products or services
performance Leeds to customer satisfaction. In the present day’s retail business,
ensuring customer satisfaction in delivering the right product and service to the
end-users is the major concern for the future growth ofthe organization. In the
present study an attempt is made to find out the customer satisfaction during
purchase in retail outlets based on customer survey.

 According to Das Prasun, 2009; A study on literature of customer satisfaction;

Literature on customer satisfaction is voluminous and spans several areas such as
marketing, management and accounting. For example, numerous papers use the
ACSI (American Customer Satisfaction Index) to study customer satisfaction at the
company, industry and macroeconomic levels. This paper focuses only on
customer satisfaction studies that are related to retailing and does not survey the
literature that studies the design of satisfaction survey instruments, as there is no
control over survey design. The basic tenet of this research stream is that higher
service quality improves customer satisfaction, resulting in better financial
performance, although the mechanisms by which this improvement happens vary.

 According to Veloutsou (2005), A research on customer satisfaction level,

describes in his study regarding customer satisfaction tangible products and
services, there is a distinction. This distinction between 14 tangible and intangible
goods becomes coz different factors of customer satisfaction, and that is why they
should be treated separate and distinct.

 According to Kotler’s study on Customer Satisfaction in the year 2019,

customer satisfaction is a feeling of pleasure or disappointment of someone who

32
 appears after comparing the performance (results) of the product thought against
the expected performance results.
 According to Sugeng, (2016), research on customer satisfaction; Customer
Satisfaction is an attitude that is decided based on the experience obtained.
Satisfaction is an assessment of the characteristics or privileges of a product or
service, or the product itself, that provides a level of consumer pleasure with regard
to meeting consumer consumption.

 According to Tjiptono, 2012, a study of customer satisfaction, Customer

Satisfaction is the customer's response to the evaluation of perception of
differences in initial expectations prior to purchase (or other performance
standards) and the actual performance of the product as perceived after wearing
or consuming the product in question.

 According to Supardiasa (2017), a study on service quality, Service Quality

affects Customer Satisfaction, where the dimensions or indicators of Service
Quality consist of personnel, services provided, appropriate prices, personnel
response to customers, and empathy for customer complaints affects the
dimensions or indicators of Customer Satisfaction.

33
 Chapter 6.
Research Methodology

34
Research definition
The Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English lays down the meaning of
research as “a careful investigation or inquiry especially through search for new facts
in any branch of knowledge.” According to Clifford Woody research comprises defining
and redefining problems, formulating hypothesis or suggested solutions; collecting,
organising and evaluating data; making deductions and reaching conclusions; and at
last carefully testing the conclusions to determine whether they fit the formulating
hypothesis.

Research Methodology
Every project work is based on certain methodology, which is a way to systematically
solve the problem or attain its objectives. It is a very important guideline and lead to
completion of any project work through observation, data collection and data analysis.
According to Clifford Woody, “Research Methodology comprises of defining &
redefining problems, collecting, organizing &evaluating data, making deductions &
researching to conclusions.” Accordingly, the methodology used in the project is as
follows:

➢ Defining the objectives of the study.

➢ Framing of questionnaire by keeping objectives in mind.

➢ Feedback from the employees and customers.

➢ Analysis of feedback.

➢ Conclusion, findings and suggestions.

Research Design
This project is based on descriptive research design. Descriptive research is a study
designed to depict the participants in an accurate way. More simply put, Descriptive
Research is all about describing people who take part in the study.

Data Collection
Data collection is the process of gathering and measuring information on variables of
interest, in an established systematic fashion that enables one to answer stated
research questions, test hypotheses, and evaluate outcomes. The data collection
component of research is common to all fields of study including physical and social
sciences, humanities, business, etc. While methods vary by discipline, the emphasis
on ensuring accurate and honest collection remains the same. The goal for all data
collection is to capture quality evidence that then translates to rich data analysis and

35
allows the building of a convincing and credible answer to questions that have been
posed.

Descriptive Data Analysis:

Descriptive Analysis is the type of analysis of data that helps describe, show or
summarize data points in a constructive way such that patterns might emerge that
fulfill every condition of the data. It is one of the most important steps for
conducting statistical data analysis. It gives you a conclusion of the distribution of your
data, helps you detect typos and outliers, and enables you to identify similarities
among variables, thus making you ready for conducting further statistical analyses.

There are two types of data collection:

➢ Primary Data: Primary data is being collected during the course of asking
questions by performing survey. It is obtained either through respondents; either
through questionnaire or through personal interviews.

Questionnaires:

For collecting data, I used questionnaire method. I used close ended questionnaires.
Close ended questions are defined as question types that ask respondents to choose
from a distinct set of pre-defined responses, such as “yes/no” or among a set multiple
choice questions. In a typical scenario, closed-ended questions are used to gather
quantitative data from respondents. Closed-ended questions come in a multitude of
forms, but are defined by their need to have explicit options for a respondent to select
from. However, one should opt for the most applicable question type on a case-bycase
basis, depending on the objective of the survey.

Sampling:

Sample Universe: The sample universe is the total number of that have participated in
the survey. The sample universe in this project is around 20 customers in Ashok
Trades Pvt. Ltd.

Sample Size: Sample size is the number of respondents in the questionnaire.

➢ Secondary Data: Secondary data is collected from previous researches and

literature to fill in the respective project. Secondary data was collected from,

• Websites

• Textbooks
36
• Going through the records of the organization, etc.

Tools for Data Analysis

For analysis and interpretation of primary data percentage analysis will be used mainly
due to qualitative nature of data and pie charts used to represent them in pictorial form.

37
 Chapter 7.
Data Analysis and Interpretation

38
Questionnaire for customers to understand satisfaction and expectation level.

1. Highly preferred product:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Kirloskar Pump 45%
2 Crompton Pump 40%
3 Lada Laxmi Pump 25%
4 Lubi Pump 20%
5 Others 10%

Analysis:
45% of customers prefers to buy Kirloskar Pump. 40% of customers prefers to buy
Crompton Pump. 25% of customers prefers to buy Lada Laxmi Pump. 20% of
customers prefers to buy Lubi Pump and 10% of customers prefers to buy other
pumps.

Interpretation:
I have observed Kirloskarkar pumps has the highest rate of buying. Crompton, Lada
Laxmi, and Lubi Pumps have less preferencewhen compared to Kirloskar pumps.

39
2. Customer satisfaction level analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Average 20%
2 Normal 40%
3 Highly satisfied 40%
Total 100%

Analysis:
40% of customers strongly agree as they are highly satisfied and 40% of customers
are neutrally satisfied with the product, and 20% of customers are average satisfied
with the product.

Interpretation:
I have observed that equal % of customers are highly and neutrally satisfied after using
the product, and 20% of the customers have rated satisfaction level as average.

40
3. Product expectation level analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Product outlook 35%
2 Usage feature of the product 20%
3 Color pattern 45%
4 No suggestions 5%
5 Others 5%

Analysis:
45% of the customers think they would has changed the color pattern of the product.
35% of the customers think they would have changed product outlook. 20% of the
customers think they would have changed the usage feature of the product.

Interpretation:
From above analysis, it can be clearly interpreted that high percentage of customers
would prefer to change only color pattern of the product if given a chance.

41
4. Product achievement level analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Yes 95%
2 No 5%
Total 100%

Analysis:
95% of customers strongly agree the product have helped to accomplish their goal
and 5% of respondents disagrees.

Interpretation:
I have observed that high % of customers that is 95% of customers agrees as the
product have helped to accomplish their goals, and less no. of customers thinks the
product have not helped them to achieve their goals.

42
5. Organizational service level analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Yes 60%
2 No 10%
3 Maybe 30%
Total 100%

Analysis:
60% of customers strongly agree they are satisfied with the service provided at Ashok
Traders. 30% of customers have neutral opinion and 10% of customers disagrees the
service.

Interpretation:
I have observed that high % of customers are satisfied with the service provided at
Ashok Trades. 10% of customers dislikes the service and 30% of customers remains
with neutral opinion.

43
6. Price range satisfaction level analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Yes 50%
2 No 20%
3 Maybe 30%
Total 100%

Analysis:
50% of the customers are satisfied with the price range of the product, 30% of the
customers remains neutral and 20% of the customers rates ‘No’, to the question.

Interpretation:
It can be interpreted that 50% of customers are satisfied with the price range of the
products. Company needs to make improvements on price range to increase
customer satisfaction level.

44
7. Product satisfaction analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Good 40%
2 Best 30%
3 Excellent 30%
Total 100%

Analysis:
40% of the customers have rated the product under ‘Good’ category, and equal no. of
customer, that is 30% of customers rates the product under ‘Best’ and ‘Excellent’
category.

Interpretation:
It can be interpreted that high percentage of customers have good experience with the
product. Comparatively, less customers have the excellence opinion about the
product.

45
8. Customer expectation satisfaction analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Yes 60%
2 No 40%
3 Maybe 0%
Total 100%

Analysis:
60% of the customers are satisfied with the employees service at Ashok Traders and
40% of the customers are not happy with the employee service at Ashok Traders.

Interpretation:
It can be interpreted that 60% of the customers are satisfied with the employees
service at Ashok Traders.

46
9. Organizational support level satisfaction analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Yes 80%
2 No 0%
3 Maybe 20%
Total 100%

Analysis:
80% of the customers are satisfied with the customer support service at Ashok Traders
and 20% of the customers are not happy with the customer support service at Ashok
Traders.

Interpretation:
It can be interpreted that huge number of customers are highly satisfied with the
customer helpdesk at Ashok Trades.

47
10. Delivery service level analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Satisfied 45%
2 Very satisfied 20%
3 Neutral 25%
4 Dissatisfied 10%
Total 100%

Analysis:
45% of the customers are satisfied with the online delivery service at Ashok Trades,
25% customers have neutral opinion, 20% of customers are highly satisfied with the
service and 10% of the customers are dissatisfied with the service.

Interpretation:
It can be interpreted that huge number of customers are satisfied with the online pump
delivery service at Ashok Traders.

48
Questionnaire for Management

 Important areas in distribution:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Reliability 30%
2 Transit 20%
3 Supply chain visibility 50%
Total 100%

Analysis:
50% of the employees thinks ‘Supply chain visibility’ is the important factor in
distribution. 30% of employees thinks ‘Reliability’ is important and 20% of employees
thinks ‘Transit’ is an important factor in distribution.

Interpretation:
As per above analysis, majority of employees thinks ‘Supply chain visibility’, is an
important factor in distribution.

49
  Inventory issue analysis:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Excess stock 30%
2 Unavailability of required stocks 40%
3 Damage of goods in storage 30%
Total 100%

Analysis:
30% of the employees confronts they face inventory issue due to ‘Excess stock’, 40%
of the employees they face issues due to ‘unavailability of required stocks’ and 30%
of employees thinks they face issues due to damage of goods in storage’.

Interpretation:
As per above analysis, majority of employees thinks ‘unavailability of required stocks,
is a main factor of inventory issue.

50
  Preferred distribution channel:

Sr. No. Particulars Percentage (%)

1 Direct distribution of customers 50%
2 Distribution through dealers 50%
Total 100%

Analysis:
50% of the employees confronts direct distribution to customers is preferable and 50%
of employees prefers distribution through dealers.

Interpretation:
As per above analysis, equal number of employees agrees with both direct distribution
and distribution through dealers.

51
 Chapter 8.
Findings & Observations

52
 From analysis 1, most of the customers preferred to buy Kirloskar pumps,
making high demand for Kirloskar products.

 From analysis 2, it was observed that moderate number of customers were

satisfied with the product after usage.

 From analysis 3, it was observed that 45% of customers was not satisfied with
the color patterns of the product.

 From analysis 4, it was observed that 95% of customers was highly satisfied
with the product with regards to their goal achievement.

 From analysis 5 & 6, it was observed that 50% of the customers were happy
with the service provided and price range of products at Ashok Traders.

 From analysis 7, it was observed that fairly high percentage of customers rates
the product under ‘good’ category.

 From analysis 8 & 9, customers were pretty satisfied with the helpdesk service
at Asok Traders.

 From analysis 10, it was observed that 45% of customers were highly satisfied
with online delivery system at Ashok Traders.

53
Suggestions

54
 Suggestions based on findings

 The organization has to concentrate more on customers who are not satisfied
with the service, price range, helpdesk and products at Ashok Traders, so that
the company’s objectives can be achieved.

 Some advanced technology needs to be implemented by the company to retain

its customers, as the objectives can be achieved only if the customers are
satisfied.

 Performance of employees as well as customer helpdesk committees needs to

be assessed regularly by the management.

 Continuous feedback from customers needs to be availed through regular

quarterly survey.

 Development on existing products needs to be implemented by the company.

 Customers expectation level should be analysed before delivering the service.

 Proper knowledge about product usage should be delivered by the employees

to the customers with help of short videos about the product usage too.

55
 Chapter 9.
Learning through the Project

56
Following are the things I have learned from the project,

 I have understood customer satisfaction level is the key factor for the company
to achieve it objectives smoothly.

 I have understood how communication skills and networking are important

while working in a sales department.

 I have learned practical process of delivering service to customers.

 I have understood the multitasking role of a intern working in a sales

department.

 I learned how to formulate a questionnaire and how to do analysis from

questionnaire.

 I have understood the importance of survey for the betterment and

development of the company.

57
 Chapter 10.
Contribution to the Host
Organization

58
My Contribution towards the organization;

 Helped to achieve organization objectives by interacting with the customers.

 Contributed towards increasing the sales volumes by cooperating with the

working team.

 Contributed towards smooth flow of daily activities of the company.

 Attained customer queries vigilantly.

 Followed all policies of the company while working over there.

 Extended ideas to achieve organizational goals to the management by following

hierarchy.

59
 Chapter 11.
Conclusion of the Project

60
 Conclusion

 Analysis of all the facts & figures, the observations and the experience during
my internship period at Ashok Trades gives a very positive conclusion regarding
the company.

 The sales team in Ashok Traders mainly concentrated on areas like

communication skills aspects, and on increasing customer satisfaction level
factor.

 Most of the respondents are satisfied with the overall service at Ashok Traders.

 As per customers, the price range should be less.

 Company needs to improve their approaches towards customers, by meeting

expectation level of customers on mark.

 Company should adopt behavioral training session to employees to benefit

company in a better way.

 The company also has to concentrate on small percentage of respondents who

are not satisfied with the service at Ashok Trades to overcome prevailing barrier
to achieve organizational goals.

 Finally, the overall procedures of managing sales at Ashok Traders are found
to be effective, credible and commendable, which can be improved further.

61
Bibliography

62
Websites Referred

1. www.salesmanagement.orgo.com

2. www.importanceofsales.co.in

3. www.objscopes/salesmgmt/deficia.com

4. www.ashoktrades.com

5. www.kirloskarbrothers.co.org.in

6. www.lubistarters.in

7. www.khyatee.co.in

8. www.cromptonkings.com

9. www.researchmethodologyimportanceandscopes.co.org.in

10. www.samplingmethods.com

11. www.zonesofresearch.com

12. www.datainterpretation.com

63
Annexure

64
Questionnaires

To Customers

65
66
67
To Management

68