CHAPTER
ONE
1.0
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Very
often, individuals and organizations conceive promotion, narrowly as involving
the process of persuading, buyers and casoling them to buy goods and services
they showcase. Marketing develops as a society and it economy develops. The
need for marketing them arises and grows as a society moves from an agrarian economy
to a free marketing economy characterized by industrialization and competition.
Since
products do not sell themselves, marketing then, has a basic challenges of
presenting products in the market place as superior to their available
substitutes. The downturn in the economy is pushing firms to begin to emphasize
customers satisfying process rather than just merely goods and services
producing process as it has been observed that consumers are becoming more
rationale in their purchase decision, given the state of their dwindling
disposal income.
Firms
and producers on their part are further responding by developing superior
strategy(s) aimed at pushing their products to the ultimate consumers. Here’s
where contemporary marketing calls for more than developing a good product or services, pricing it adequately and making it available to
target consumers (A chumba 2000) Firms should communicate and promote their goods and services
with a view to winning the potential customers choice decision, as it is
, the customer’s decision that
determines whether the organization in the prosper.
Udel (1997)
identifies marketing promotion as the most important facet of marketing
strategy leading to success promotional mix are now accepted by top management as effective tools for
firm to survive because
product managers are under great
pressure to in crease their current market share, product awareness and
perception, consumer loyalty, organization sales volume and profit.
Promotional
mix elements have become the most powerful weapon used by sales and marketing
practitioners, and organization to build their brands and make the business or
organization to survive the hard times, most especially in this recessionary
periods. Promotion is an exercise of informing the purchase of products.
Promotion relates to those activities, which are designed to bring a company’s
goods or services to the awareness of the consumers or ultimate consumer to
their favourable attention.
Viewed
at the pedestal level, marketing promotion is the act of transmitting
information for marketing purposes. This comprises the elements such as
advertising, personal selling, sales promotions and public relations/publicity
which are commonly referred to as the promotional mix. Promotional mix elements
are not mutually exclusive. Firms will require strategic mix of two or more of
these elements depending on their type of products or services, promotional
objective, completion, budget and the potential target market.
The
various combinations of activities directed at matching the promotional tools
to achieve the overall corporate goals are referred to as promotional strategy
(Ogbechie 1997). Promotional strategy will hence be time and company
determined. The reasons why firms undertake goods and services producing
process is usually the result of indentified need(s) and effort at satisfying
these need(s), using available organizational resources, at a profit to the
producer.
This
study is therefore carried out to measure the effectiveness of promotional mix
elements on organizational profitability.
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM:
This fundamental goal of
promotion is to cause a bodily shift of the demand curve to the right, thus
allowing more units to be sold at a practical price or the same units to be sold
at a higher price. The presence of Economic turn down has increased the
relevance of promotion. Expenditure on promotion by organization in the service
or product sector is therefore soaring to an all time high. Promotional
activities are assuming more sophistication and innovation (Kotler 1984).
Firms, especially those
within the same industry are matching each other wit for wit, promotion for
promotion to attract and retain their customers. Recession apparently makes
consumers more responsive to promotion activities by firms resulting in firms
doing a shift in the fit but to acquiring substantial market share, winning
back lost prospects or customers and competitors customers.
According to Onanuga (1992),
promotion should be intensified at recessionary periods because too many goods
will be chasing the same way. Engel et al (1983) suggested that certain
economic environments are better suited to certain promotional campaign.
Money-off or other types of cash refunds seem to work well when the economy is
depressed, while contest and premium or other forms of non-price incentive may
be more effective at times of relative prosperity.
Religious and cultural
values may impact differently and put to question the effectiveness of some
promotional mix elements employed. For example, Muslim faithful express serious
resentment on the consumption of alcoholic beverages.
Ignorance of the promotion
or product attributes and general back of awareness may cause consumers to
express apathy and doubts on the sincerity of the firm’s claims to honour its
promise to give out prizes.
Another obvious purpose such
as health, consumers may have a mixed reaction to promotional activities.
Diabetes and other consumer mindful of their health may be indifferent to juicy
promotional campaign incentives.
1.3 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
The purpose of this study
is:
i.
To determine the extent to which promotional
mix elements impact on an organization performance.
ii.
To ascertain the level of relationship
between promotional strategy and organizational profitability.
iii.
To identify the most effective promotional
campaign tool elements to be employed by the industry at recessionary periods.
iv.
To attempt to establish a relationship if any
between promotional campaign elements at recessionary periods on organizational
profitability.
1.4 RELEVANT RESEARCH QUESTIONS
In a bid to accomplish the
purpose of this study, attempts were made to fix appropriate answers to the
following research questions.
1.
To what extent will the expenditure in
promotion by organization affect the organization’s profit?
2.
What promotional strategy or strategies have
been mostly adopted at these recessionary periods ad their effectiveness?
3.
To what extent can religious and cultural
values affect sales promotional activities employed by firms to achieve their
aims?
4.
To what extent does advertising create
awareness on product attributes?
5.
To what extent will public relations
influence consumers perception of the brands or product on religious or health
grounds?
1.5
TESTABLE
HYPOTHESES
In
addition to the stated relevant research questions given above, this study
tested the following hypotheses.
1.
Promotional strategy (Pragrammes) is a
determination of organizational profitability
2.
Company’s derives benefits from using the
promotional mix elements/tools
3.
There is a positive relationship between
promotional programmes and sales volume.
1.6
SIGNIFICANCE
OF THE STUDY
At
times of depression, with its accompanying
low level real per capital income, higher consumer awareness and
resistance, it be comes imperative for firms to respond appropriately by
adopting viable promotional programmes in a
bid to increase her market share, retain consumers loyalty, turnover and
margin.
Findings
of the study provides information that
will serves as a guide to prosper policy
formulation, implementation and evaluation
of promotional strategy by
telecommunication firms at these austere period. Further more, it is expected
to produce result which will enable professional marketers, policy maker,
researchers and practitioners’ alike better apply and understand promotional
strategies in terms of their functions and effectiveness on organizational
objectives and profitability this is a frame work that will encourage further
research endeavor in elevating the effectiveness of promotional programmes.
[
1.7 Scope and limitation of the study:
This study will
attempt to measure the effectiveness of promotional campaign tool on
organizational profitability in the telecommunication industry. Nigeria
telecommunication industry is selected as a case study because of the enormous
size, its domineering posture especially among the underdeveloped world. The
study shall therefore be limited to Nigeria telecommunication industry because
it is adequately a representative of other telecommunication firms spread a
cross the globe. Attempt to cover virtually all the nation’s telecommunication
firms will be very cumber some and take a longer time to accomplish.
1.8 Definition of terms
i.
Effectiveness: this is the capability of producing
a desired result. It also means
achieving an intended or expected out comes.
ii.
Telecommunication: It is the transmission of
information over a distance to communicate. It involves the use of electrical
dev ices e.g. the telegraph, telephone, teleprompter as well as the use of
radio and microwave.
iii.
Industry is the production of an economic
goods or servicers within an economy.
iv.
Profitability: Is the capacity to make a
profit. The state or quality of being profitable.
v.
Scales volume: The quantity or number of
goods or servicers sold in the normal operation of a company in a specified
period.
vi.
Market share: Is the percentage of a market accounted for
by a specific entity. It could be in terms of either in units or revenue.
vii.
Organization: A social unit of people,
systematical structured and managed to meet a need or to pursue collective
goals on a continuing basis.
viii.
Promotional mix: This connotes advertising
personal selling, sales promotion, public relation /publicity, direct
marketing.
REFERENCES
A Chumba, I. C. (2000). Strategic marketing management in
the 21st century, Macwillians
and capital publisher Inc. charlotte, U.S.A.
Ekakitiete Sunny Emena (2010). Marketing communication
and scope.
Onanuga .P. (1992 July).
Launching a new product in a Deregulated Economy. Marketing journal.
Ogbechie .C. (1997). Do you have problems with sales
policy magazine January 20—26.