Competitive strategies and sustainable competitive advantage at the nation media group limited, Kenya

Abstract

Over the years, the turbulent ever changing environment has resulted to cut-throat competition within the media industry in Kenya. A scanning of the environment through the SWOT and PESTEL analysis indicated that sustainable competitive advantage is the only option for the Nation Media Group to survive in the media industry. The objective of the study was to find out the strategies adopted and upheld by the Nation Media Group in order to remain competitive in the media industry despite a dynamic complex environment. Primary data will be collected using an interview guide. The respondent will be four managers of nation Media Group. The operations manager will provide information of competitive strategy; Human resource manager on staff performance to attain the organizations objective, business development manager will guide on planning and best business opportunities for sustainable competitive advantage and finance manager to provide information on capital resources. From the findings, Nation Media Group is competing with other players for content market, geographical coverage and advertising revenue. To succeed in such a turbulent environment, the organization has adopted three generic strategies on low cost leadership, differentiation and focus. Nation media group uses low cost strategy to compete in the radio and newspapers business market. The competitive nature of the media industry is clear with the presence of fourteen FTA TV stations, four pay TV channels, one hundred and forty radio stations and threat of entrant of new media, product and service differentiation is critical to the success of any media house. In terms of human capital, the Nation Media Group invests in employing the best presenters, news anchors and reporters. Some of the human capital has been developed internally from experience, though some of them are head hunted from other leading media houses. The study concludes that the strategies used by the Nation Media Group Limited have been successful because they have ensured that the organization though a new entrant in some segments like television have considerable market share of customer base. The study recommended that a census research be done to include all the media houses and find out what other competitive strategies and sustainable advantage are adopted by the other media houses to cope with competition.