Spotlight on Valarie Zeithaml: Internationally Recognized Marketing Pioneer
By Eleanor Lee Yates

alarie Zeithaml, an internationally recognized teacher, author and pioneer in services marketing, has stepped into a starring role as UNC Kenan-Flagler's senior associate dean for academic affairs. But she is no stranger to the spotlight.

Zeithaml, the Roy and Alice H. Richards Bicentennial Professor, has been marketing area chair at UNC Kenan-Flagler for more than four years.

"With the completion of initiatives such as strategic planning and branding and the setting of new goals such as thought leadership, UNC Kenan-Flagler is poised to grow and change," Zeithaml said. "I am excited to be joining the leadership team at this time of opportunity."

Her many accolades include a recent prestigious book award - the American Marketing Association Foundation's Berry-AMA Book Prize. The award recognizes the marketing book of the past three years that has had the most impact on marketing and related fields.

"Driving Customer Equity: How Customer Lifetime Value is Reshaping Corporate Strategy" was written by Zeithaml, Roland Rust (MBA '77, PhD '79), chair of marketing at the University of Maryland's Robert Smith School of Business, and Katherine N. Lemon, professor of Boston College's Wallace E. Carroll School of Management.

"The book explores why corporations should rethink traditional product-centered marketing strategies and embrace customer equity," Zeithaml said. "In fast-moving industries that involve customer relationships, products may come and go, but customers remain. Once a firm knows which drivers - value equity, brand equity or relationship equity - are most important to customers, it knows exactly where to invest its marketing resources."

Zeithaml also is the author of a best-selling business book, "Delivering Quality Service: Balancing Customer Perceptions and Expectations," and the textbook, "Services Marketing." She has won numerous teaching and research awards and was honored by the American Marketing Association with its Career Contributions to the Services Discipline Award.

Zeithaml has consulted with approximately 50 companies, including IBM, Kaiser Permanente and General Electric.

Her work with companies has given her the opportunity to apply what she has learned in the field.

"I use virtually all of my research in my courses, whether MBA or Executive Education," she said. "Because I have worked with managers, I can often anticipate the issues that students will raise in class."

She is a co-developer, with UNC Kenan-Flagler information technology and e-commerce professor Arvind Malhotra, of a scale for measuring consumer perceptions of service quality. She was an early researcher of e-commerce and warned companies that success depended on quality customer service, not just good prices.

Zeithaml views one of her most important roles as mentoring junior faculty.

"It's important for us to learn how to be excellent contributors in three areas: research, teaching and service," said Rebecca K. Ratner, assistant marketing professor. "Valarie is a wonderful role model, because she excels in all three areas."

For years, Zeithaml has taught a popular customer equity course to MBA students. Her award-winning customer equity book is used in the course, and students say her ability to involve students is a hallmark of her teaching style.

"She invites students to think critically in the classroom," said J.J. Froehlich, president of the MBA Student Association. "She guides the discussion so that students feel they are integral to the learning process."