Strategic Role of Marketing as a Competitive Tool for Growth and Survival in the Kenyan Banking Industry (Thesis Proposal Sample)

STRATEGIC ROLE OF MARKETING AS A COMPETITIVE TOOL FOR GROWTH AND SURVIVAL IN THE KENYAN BANKING INDUSTRY; A CASE OF EQUITY BANK EMBU COUNTY
SPECIALIZATION: MARKETING
A RESEARCH PROPOSAL PAPER SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE OF MASTERS OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION (MARKETING) OF KENYATTA UNIVERSITY
KENYATTA UNIVERSITY
SEPTEMBER, 2016
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Every organizations/ business firm intends to remain in business profitably as Dwivedi (2002) revealed and that the major objectives of all business firm is not only profit maximization but as well include the following: maximizing sales revenue/ deposit, maximizing firms growth rate, maximizing utility function, making satisfactory rate of profit, long run survival of the firm, entry prevention and risk avoidance among others, so it was to be noted that all these could be possibly achieved through marketing strategies.
There are basically four principal areas of operations within all firms, namely: Accounting, Finance, Management and Marketing. Adebisi and Abdulazeez (2000) defined Accounting as the process of collecting, classifying, recording, summarizing and interpreting the financial events of a business for the purpose of making decision on the financial state and progress of the business. Van Horne (2002) described the main functions of finance to include investment in assets and new products, determining the best mix of financing and dividends in relation to company’s overall valuation. Management is defined by Oyekunle and Adeniyi (2001) as a mental activity, which is concerned with the work of planning, organizing, staffing, directing or leading and controlling for the accomplishment of the stated objectives of an organization.
Marketing is defined as the process of determining consumer wants for a product or service, motivating its sale and distributing it to ultimate consumption at a profit. So, marketing is majorly responsible for generation of revenue, through the exchange process and customer’s satisfaction, which makes the unit to be indispensable in every organization. Dwivedi (2007) explained that finance functions are important, but not as important as the marketing functions. Thus, every firm that produces products either tangible or intangible, to existing or potential customers need marketing personnel and strategy for its growth, survival and profit maximization. Some people thought that marketing is just about advertising or sales, but it goes beyond that, it also involve everything a company does to acquire customers and maintain good relationship with them, creation of demand for company’s products, its distribution and other services for customers who purchase the product and/or service (Jomo, 2010).
The banking institution as a major sector in the service industry occupies a central position in the financial system in any economy as described by Bamidele and Kama (2003). Commercial bank as a component of Deposit Money Banks (DMBs) plays significant role of mobilizing savings from surplus sector to the deficit sectors in the economy with the aim of achieving the goals of profitability, liquidity and solvency. It is important to note that this function is critical to the success of any economy. Marketing scope in banking sector is considered under the service marketing framework. Bank marketing does not only include service selling but also the function which gets personality and image for bank on its customers’ mind in order to solve the problem of intangibility among others.
Commercial Banks offer different financial services to individuals, firms, and governments like deposits, extension of credit facilities, safekeeping of valuables, agents of transfer of fund, business advisory services, business reports and references etc. it is important to emphasize that many of these services are also carried out by rivals institutions (formal and informal) like savings and loans institutions, cooperative societies etc. Hence, it is needful for commercial banks to adopt the marketing strategies that will allow it to maintain and sustain its competitive advantage. Marketing strategy is the marketing logic which the commercial banks can adopt to satisfy their customers and achieve its set corporate objectives. It is made up of specific strategies for target markets, positioning, marketing mix among others (Osuagwu, 2001).
As described by Nokandeh, Poorhabib, Seyedi and Niknafs (2013) banks’ marketing involve creating a comprehensive marketing plan for assessment and finding hidden and visible need of customer and finding most useful markets. In today's competitive environment, the survival of bank depends on their ability to deal with environmental challenges which also lies on marketing. Marketing of banking service is so important because of banks’ aim to increase its profit. Banks need to increase their profit in order to create new markets, to protect and develop their market shares and to survive on basis of intense competition through customers’ retention and strategic marketing. Many Banks in recent time failed and went out of business probably, because the insignificant tool (marketing) for organization’s success was not properly utilized. So, marketing consideration should be an integral part of every organization because the success of every firm is the result of satisfying the wants, needs and demands of its customers.
Frank and Bernanke (2007) defined commercial banks as privately owned firms that accept deposits from individual and businesses and use those deposits to make loans. It explained further that, the determination of money supply in a modern economy depends in part, on the behavior of commercial banks and their depositors, which makes the industry, and their customers deposit to be very essential. So, to improve those deposits, marketing is very essential. As described by Perreault and McCarthy (2002), people think that marketing is about selling and advertisement only but, it also extended to identifying customer’s needs, as well as making those needs so well that the product almost sells itself. This is applicable to whether the product is a physical good or services or even an idea. So, if the whole marketing has been done well, the customers might not need much persuasion but customers will always be ready to buy. Kotler and Keller (2006) pronounce that marketing is everywhere, formally or informally.
Zikmund and Michael (2006) explained that financial success often depends on marketing ability, finance, operations, accounting and other business functions but the success will not be actually realized if there is no sufficient demand for product and service offering of the firm which makes marketing function to be so important. Bamidele and Kama (2003) described the increase in the use of marketing in banking industry as a result of four accruing factors, namely increase competition to customers, increase sophistication of those customers, increase technology, and increase cost of meeting customers need profitably
The Role of Marketing as a Competitive Tool in Banking Industry
Traditionally, there are four P’s of marketing but, there are three additional P’s which makes service marketing to be seven (7 P’s), as described by Mas’ud and Yamzid (2009), which are Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People, Process and Physical Evidence. The appropriate mix of these are good ingredient for bank sound performance. Marketing Strategy is a major tool used by marketers to penetrate the market with programs that will convince potential customers and retain the existing ones. Marketing has been a good competitive tool for growth and survival in banking industry through series of role it performed in the industry. Some of these roles include marketing research, product and business development, market plan formulation and strategy, marketing of banking services and strengthening customer relationship. Alvin and Ronald (2001) defined marketing research as the systematic and objective search for an analysis of information to guide managers in marketing planning and problem solving. Marketing research assists marketers to identify customers’ need and want and how to satisfy them. It helps marketers to get customers information in terms of income level, socio-cultural factors that could affect sales volume and any barrier that could affect demand.
In terms of product and business development, it is the role of the marketing unit of the bank to develop new products and look for ways of developing businesses for the bank within the society. They make sure that they produce an evenly challenging and competitive product to withstand the competitive market in to retain and gain more customers as well as surviving in the industry. Market Plan Formulation and Strategy a function of the marketer, which plays a significant role as a tool for survival and growth in the competitive market. It helps banks to plan about how to carry out their activities and programs and as well formulate differentiated strategies that could be used to offer products that are better than that of the competitors.
As concluded by Uppal (2010) only those banks who face the competition with the effective ways of marketing will survive. Marketing of Banking Services is the most common role of marketers understood by the majority. They (bank marketers) ensure that the products and services offered by the banks are demanded for by the customers, they try as much as possible to create personal awareness to customers and convince them of the benefit they could derive. Many constraints are faced by bank marketers as a result of the distinctive c...