Strategies Used by Ecobank Kenya to Gain Competitive Advantage

Abstract

Organization being environmental dependent have to constantly adopt activities and internal configurations to reflect the new external realities since failure to do so, may put future success of the organization in jeopardy.The study aimed at establishing how Ecobank is achieving sustainable competitive advantage. To achieve this two research objectives were used to determine the basis of achieving sustainable competitive advantage at Ecobank .The research was conducted through a case study; The interview guide was developed in accordance with the objectives. Content analysis was performed with the information obtained. The study established that most of Ecobank branches are located in strategic locations, and offer a variety of products at affordable prices. The findings also revealed that when focusing on market, they begin by selecting a market niche where buyers have distinctive preferences. Ecobank Limited has adopted a low cost leadership basis to gain competitive advantage in order to lower overall costs than competitors. The study concludes that pricing strategy was used to a great extent adopting a cost conscious organizational culture, intolerance of waste, intensive screening of budgets and broad employee‟s participation in cost control efforts. The study also concludes that differentiation strategy approach was used to focus on developing a reputation for superior quality products. From the findings and conclusions, the study recommends that in order to keep up with completion, firms must constantly search for competitive strategy that will ensure competitive advantage in the long term and yield market leadership and that the management should engage various strategies to survive in a dynamic and highly competitive business environment. The research study was faced by resistance from target respondents fearing that the information requested would be used for other purposes, apart from academic. The study recommends that further research should be done on other organizations in the public sector so also get comprehensive information on how the other players in the sector have responded towards competition in their quest to achieve Sustainable Competitive Advantage.