The private sector and profit aiming organizations work continuously on marketing their products and services. At the beginning of each year, a marketing plan is drawn up after reviewing the organization’s strategic plan and based on market research. Thus, recently distinguished governments are making marketing plans for their services.

Customer orientation in the private and public sector:

Usually in the private sector institutions compete for satisfying customers and are keen to achieve profits for the owners, however, in the public sector, government institutions compete to satisfy customers (citizens and non-citizens) to obtain their satisfaction because those dealing with the government are the ones who finance those services provided by the government to them.

A new approach in public administration:

The concept of marketing and providing distinguished services to customers is the invention of the private sector as it is a lot of standards of quality and excellence, however, recently this concept has been adopted by governments that want to obtain the satisfaction of their customers (citizens – non-citizens), while several ways must be adopted by the government to measure the extent of customer satisfaction with its services including questionnaires and the development of methodologies to analyze and encourage customers to submit suggestions and complaints about the purposes of improving services, It is the government’s responsibility to improve the level of performance in providing services to achieve satisfaction through a plan that includes analysis of the current situation and then setting the goals that it seeks to increase the efficiency of government services.

How to transform into a customer-oriented organization?

1. Focus on customers:

One of the most important pillars of marketing in the public sector is to focus on customers (citizens and non-citizens) and to identify their needs and try to meet them within the laws and governing regulations by all means and methods to increase the satisfaction with the services provided to them by the government.

2. Change the culture of the organization:

By motivating employees and encouraging them to provide distinguished services to customers, in addition to training and development.

3. Set up the infrastructure:

Physical infrastructure is required to reach the citizens wherever they are in person or online.

4. Develop modern and dynamic systems:

Through developing methodologies that help provide services fairly, and adopting modern systems that help in managing customer relations, and most importantly, finding standards for providing services and applying them initially in institutions that have a direct connection with customers.

5. Follow up the plan’s implementation:

Following up is an important step, which is measuring the performance, and detecting problems to develop creative means to provide services that exceed customers’ expectations. It is important to take into account customers reviews, and create constant communication with them, in addition to responding to problems and conducting researches and studies on government services, and benefiting from feedback as a reliable source of information to improve services.

6. Quality management:

Services are a set of intangible products or activities that are provided to the audience of beneficiaries to satisfy their desires and needs in return for the payment or any other benefit. Citizen seeks to obtain the public service with ease, and without any administrative complications, however, many organizations may be characterized by a decrease in the quality of the performance of those services, which leads to the citizen’s dissatisfaction with the level of performance of those services. And there were common situations that the use of quality is linked only to commodity production in general, but this concept has changed a lot, as developed countries tended to apply total quality management systems, not only in industrial production but in all service institutions in various fields such as education and Health, Security…etc. As a result, it has been confirmed that the main factor for the success of any industrial or service establishment is mainly the quality of the services or products provided by that establishment. Many countries have responded by meeting the needs and desires of citizens to improve the level of public service performance, and it has become the basis for the goals of these organizations, which they are working to achieve.

Quality control in public institutions:

The starting point for developing public services provided to citizens is to answer these questions:

• What is the concept of service in a public organization?
• How can quality policies be put into practice in public organizations?
• How can quality be measured, monitored and evaluated in public organizations?

The concept of quality of public services:

Quality is one of the topics that were addressed by modern management at the end of the twentieth century and one of the biggest challenges that required attention due to the revolutionary advancement in information technology and technological development in commodity and service production, as well as the great competition that exists in all markets, which confirmed that the traditional production of a good or service has become unable, in its characteristics, to meet those challenges, therefore a new thought emerged in management, which is total quality management, based on the concept of high quality of the product or service and the related customer satisfaction and fulfillment of his/her desires, which represents the key to the success of any production of private or public organization.

There is no doubt that this approach is a successful administrative model for government organizations that seek to improve the quality of their performance. This approach has allowed many government agencies to advance their services and customer satisfaction such as Japan, the United States, and the United Kingdom.

How to implement a marketing strategy in the public sector?

Steps to build a distinguished administrative system that achieves the quality of government services:

1. Determining the beneficiaries of the service.
2. Determining the services provided by the administrative authority.
3. Determining the main objective of the administrative unit, which is to achieve excellence and distinction in the quality of service performance.
4. Defining criteria for measuring the quality of service performance.
5. Measure the public opinion of the beneficiaries of the service and identify the extent of their satisfaction with it.
6. Continuous evaluation of policies and procedures related to service performance.
7. Training of service-providing employees and increasing their skills in performance and customer service.

Characteristics that must be available in public service providers:

1. The keenness of service providers to provide assistance to the public benefiting from services.
2. Familiarity with information and procedures related to the service delivery.
3. Taking into account the privacy of the service.
4. Availability of sufficient time to perform the service for each citizen.
5. Enable the citizen to ask questions and inquiries, and the willingness of service providers to answer them.

Factors of success in implementing the quality management in governmental services:

1. Conviction of the administrative leaders of the importance of applying the methods of total quality.
2. Conviction of the administrative leaders of the importance of applying the concepts of modern management.
3. Explaining the objectives of total quality systems to all employees.
4. Forming working teams (quality departments) to design and implement the service quality system.
5. Follow-up implementation.
6. Continuous development of the system.

Dimensions of developing and marketing government services:

• The political dimension:

Focusing on services is in line with the state’s political goals. Focusing on citizens’ services leads to political stability. Enhancing citizens’ confidence in the performance of government agencies. The success of the programs leads to the support of citizens and the achievement of public satisfaction. Thus the success of development programs requires continuous political support.

• The economic dimension:

The service development plan is linked to the needs of implementing the state’s economic development plan, especially in the field of services provided to investors. Development leads to increasing work productivity, reducing waste of resources, combating administrative waste, and optimizing the use of resources. Improving service performance helps to increase the revenues generated by the various government services.

• The social dimension:

Programs are linked to the needs of the community. It helps in increasing the role of government in social development, developing the citizens’ behavior through their dealings with the government by offering a decent and high-quality service, and following procedures to create a distinguished relationship between the public employee and the citizen along with achieving positive participation of all government agencies and their interest in the goals of society as a whole which requires focusing on the human resources in terms of preparation, selection, and training.

Conclusion.

The process of marketing public and governmental services is one of the modern trends in public administration, as business and profit-oriented organizations tended to apply marketing as one of the vital tasks of the administration to determine the needs and want of customers and thus provide the appropriate product to them. This concept transferred to public administration because of its political, economic, and social impact on citizens and non-citizens who benefit from these services, while quality is the essence of excellence in government service and the main feature on which marketing is based in public administration with all its requirements of systems, the human element, material, and technological capabilities.