BEIJING, May 9 /Xinhua-PRNewswire/ -- CCID Consulting, China's leading research, consulting and IT outsourcing service provider, and the first Chinese consulting firm listed in Hong Kong (stock code: HK08235), recently reviewed China's IT services market in the first quarter of 2007. CCID says that, affected by a slowdown in system integration and hardware support services, sales volume in China's IT services market in 2007Q1 experienced a year-on-year drop from last year. However, volume still grew by 16.1%. Despite fast growth, outsourcing services fell short of the forecasted growth. Meanwhile, the demand for consulting services was strong. Also, there was a particularly notable growth in outsourcing-related consulting, indicating that users were very interested in outsourcing services. However, due to a lack of sufficient understanding and management knowledge, users also relied on improved IT management in their outsourcing decisions. IT education and training services continued their early growth momentum and grew slightly faster than overall market growth.
For ''Fig. 1, IT Services Product Structure in 2007Q1,'' please refer to http://www.ccidconsulting.com/upload_fr/07050901.jpg .
IT education and training services have been in development in China for over 20 years. As IT applications in the country deepen, such services are now covering wider and wider user groups. Training content is also getting richer and richer. It is precisely because of this that, in the face of growingly differentiated demand and user groups with different characteristics, the most direct method to check IT training services providers' services quality is to examine user satisfaction. CCID Consulting has conducted multi-level tracking surveys of user satisfaction in China's IT education and training market for five consecutive years. In 2007Q1, CCID Consulting undertook the latest round of focal examinations of user satisfaction in the market. The goal was to analyze vendors' notability and comprehensive user satisfaction. Through comparing the results with past surveys, some new changes in the market were found. There was a rise in overall user satisfaction with IT education and training. However, users still had high expectations that improvements would be made in services management and job services.
Through over 20 years of development, vendors have started brand-based operations. But, there has been no notable differentiation of their product provision and brand image. Meanwhile, users are more refined and mature in their consumption. They have gradually accrued clearer consumption goals. The result of this is that users comprehensively consider their consumption selections. In the process of buying training courses, they no longer just pay attention to training institutions' brand awareness. They also pay attention to the following aspects:
1. Teaching Quality:
This refers to training institutions' teaching force makeup, instructors' qualifications and teaching experiences, and other aspects as well. The training materials selected require authoritativeness and leadership. Meanwhile, whether courses are advanced, whether they can connect with job posts and how time is allocated between theory and practice courses are also important factors that affect user satisfaction.
2. Management Quality:
In addition to teaching quality, reigning institutions' overall level of teaching software and hardware management is also directly related to user satisfaction. The quality of services provided by training institutions' working staff, and especially the course introduction and recommendation work done by their sales personnel, exert the most direct impact. The hardware environment of training, such as classroom environment and class PC performances, also greatly affect students' satisfaction. Besides this, the handling of certain types of situations will also affect users' devaluation of training institutions. This is particularly the case in the handling of complaints.
3. Training Effects:
The most direct sign that users are refined consumers is that they have clear goals for the trainings they attend. Their pursuit of improving their own ability and competitiveness are more specifically embodied in their pursuit of authoritative and well-known brand certificates along with guarantees in meeting employers' requirements. Whether they can eventually receive training certification and how much the training can help their professional career and job prospects are the key factors affecting user satisfaction.
4. Price:
Though price is not the decisive factor in user satisfaction, it nevertheless contains users' monetary evaluation of training institutions' services. If users are satisfied with the services they receive, but express dissatisfaction with the price, it implies that the services provided by training institutions are still short of user expectations. There is still user demand uncovered.
Through research and surveys, CCID Consulting finds that users are generally satisfied with training institutions' selection of training text, infrastructure, course setup and certification. But, overall user evaluations of services management, employment and price were low. This shows that China's IT education and training market has won user recognition in providing the necessary services to clients, but there is still a need to improve services quality. This is particularly true in the case of sales management and the handling of complaints.
In 2006, the rankings of IT education and training brands which users in China were most familiar with were as follows: Beida Jade Bird APTECH, Tsinghua IT, NIIT, Wish-edu, WNT and Easthome. Beida Jade Bird APTECH continued to maintain a big lead in notability. Meanwhile, Wish-edu experienced the fastest rise in notability. Within one year, it quickly grew from a local training brand into a national one. The survey and research results show that Wish-edu had an overall score of 85.93 points in user satisfaction, 0.42 points higher than that of the second-placed WNT. This was the highest satisfaction score among all training institutions. In terms of teaching staff and infrastructure, all these brands received very similar results in user evaluations, showing that there were few differences in what users could experience on these two fronts.
The survey results indicate that users of IT education and training in China have started to mature. Training institutions need to change their competitive strategies from basic services ability to in-depth services ability. The market is still growing fast and demand is strong. Setting up more outlets, expanding operational scale and increasing services will continue to be the key areas of competition in the next stage. However, strengthening services management, improving the reigning effect and accommodating the demand for manpower will be necessary strategies for ensuring healthy and sustainable development.
About CCID Consulting
CCID Consulting Co., Ltd. (also known as CCID Consulting), the first Chinese consulting firm listed in the Growth Enterprise Market of the Stock Exchange (GEM) of Hong Kong (stock code: HK08235), is a direct affiliate of the China Center for Information Industry Development (hereinafter known as CCID Group). Headquartered in Beijing, CCID Consulting has so far set up branch offices in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Harbin, with over 300 professional consultants and industry experts. The Company's business scope has covered over 200 large- and medium-sized cities in China. Apart from home market development, CCID Consulting is establishing international cooperation links across the United States, the Asia-Pacific region and Europe, by setting up agents in the U.S., Japan, South Korea, Australia, Singapore, Italy and Russia, with the aim of going global.
Based on the four major competitive areas of powerful data channels, industrial resources, intense knowledge and deep understanding of information technology, CCID Consulting provides customers with consulting, research and IT outsourcing services covering strategy planning, IT application, marketing strategy, human resources and information technology outsourcing. Our customers range from industrial users in IT, telecommunications, energy, finance, automobile, to government departments at all levels and diversified industrial parks.
CCID Consulting is committed to becoming the No. 1 brand for strategy consulting, the No. 1 consultant for enterprise management and the No. 1 expert in market research. For more information, please visit our website at http://en.ccidconsulting.com/ .
For more information, please contact: Grace Gao CCID Consulting Co., Ltd. Tel: 
+86-10-8855-9020
Email: gaojie@ccidconsulting.com
CONTACT: Grace Gao of CCID Consulting Co., Ltd.,
gaojie@ccidconsulting.com
