Preschool Education Market Research: Mystery Shopping Technology
Preschool education market is in the stage of growth. Despite the state-guaranteed access and free of charge Russian preschool education the majority of parents (buyers of service) are not satisfied with the quality of the education. In this regard the sector of private preschool education services is actively developing. To identify issues specific to this market and to find the solutions, the authors conducted a marketing research of preschool education services in Moscow region using the technology Mystery shopping. The results of the research identified significant systemic problems which the centers of children development are faced. First of all this is an insufficient logistical (material and technical) support, the lack of additional services that are of interest to parents, low culture of interaction with customers, ineffective communications. The ways of fortifying the competitiveness were suggested: elimination of the revealed drawbacks and the introduction of monitoring of satisfaction of customers (parents) and direct users (children) by the quality and availability of the services.