An investigation of aspects of marketing planning within large private manufacturing companies in Nairobi

Abstract

This study intended to find out how marketing planning is practiced in the Kenyan manufacturing sector. The focus of the study was on manufacturing firms operating in Nairobi who are members of the Kenyan association of manufacturers. The objective was to investigate the state and use of marketing planning to gain competitive edge by the large, private manufacturing companies in Kenypt To achieve these objectives 3 hypothesis were formulated and tested. Data was collected through self-administered questionnaires. The questionnaires had both the structured and unstructured questions. Respondents were marketing decision-makers of the selected firms, The collected data was analysed using descriptive statistics. Likert profiles were drawn to show any visual differences. Further analysis was done using the Kruskal Wallis rank test. The study found that the principles of marketing planning are well known but the practice is still very poor in the Kenyan manufacturing sector. While most of marketing planners seemed conversant with the principles of strategic marketing planning, few lived by then a, They focused too much on tactical marketing planning and emphasized more on business system, sophisticated techniques and lengthy writings assignments. Firms owned by foreigners are more involved in marketing planning but there was no difference among Firms operating in various sectors of the economy. Most of those charged with the process complained of lack of support from the top management. They claimed that too much pressure to produce results in the short-run forced them to have short-term plans leaving the future of the firms to chance. If marketing planning is to have any impact in our organizations, It must be based on continuous dialogue between key managers and be build solidly into the management process rather than be treated as a discrete function. The focus should be on substantive improvement in forward thinking and action through analytical analysis, continual environmental scanning and more top management input. While tactical planning remains important, marketing planners must invest more in long-term planning to increase the chances of the future survival of their business.