How to market professional services

One of the most vital issues in marketing professional services is building client satisfaction and loyalty. In many of the firms I work with the same results are reflected year after year. Clients seem to be happy about technical competence of firms but are looking for more. An interesting question here was studied by Professor Chebat from HEC Montreal. He studied the client's decision making processes when appointing consulting engineers. His findings are very interesting. For example, when appointing a firm which is the most important to the satisfaction of clients?

A. Quality, that is competence, reliability and communication; or,
B. Value, that is fairness of price, acceptable time and reasonable effort?

Chebat found that clients are more interested in value than quality. Their perception of value is based on the positive perception of the sacrifice or “give” component in the relationship because they are so involved in the project development. It seems in this case technical quality is not irrelevant its just assumed to be at a high level as a price of consideration.