The Effect of Export Marketing Strategy on the Relationship between Firm Competencies and Export Performance of Small and Medium Manufacturing Exporters in Uganda

Abstract

Both the size and rapid growth of globalization have focused the attention of international business researchers on the factors associated with firms’ export performance. However, knowledge of this increasingly important domain of international business activity, particularly in the context of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) from a developing country context remains limited. To address this gap, we draw on the strategy and export marketing literature to develop a framework for the relationship between firm competencies, export marketing strategy and export performance. Theoretically, firm competencies shape a firm’s export marketing strategy, which in turn, determine its export performance, highlighting the central role of export marketing strategy in the firm competencies-export performance relationship. Nonetheless, due to resource poverty that often characterize SMEs, this relationship require empirical reaffirmations as not all SMEs involved in export manufacturing business may have the capacity to develop a coherent export marketing strategy. The authors empirically assess the predicted relationship using survey data from 76 SMEs in export manufacturing in Uganda. Our findings show that export marketing strategy, contrary to our hypothesis, had an inconsequential effect on the relationship between firm competencies and export performance.