dc.description.abstract | The 21st Century marketing has been defined by an explosion in data and a need to make
informed choices based on the strategic inclination of firms in regards to marketing. With
this advent of big data influenced decisions, marketers have also been under pressure to
measure and justify their expenditures of the resources allocated to their dockets. Besides
the dynamic and fluid nature of the FMCG retailing sector, competition is rife and
marketers consistently evolve and adjust their marketing plans and tactics to protect their
position or grow their market share. In essence to flourish in this modern data driven,
globalized and technology driven markets firms are obliged to develop proper plans.
Strategic marketing allows firms to attract and maintain customers, warrant proficient
utilization of resources as well as stimulating growth in trade. For a firm to successfully
select and align its operations with the right marketing strategies they have invested in
retail measurement for insights. This has been made possible by the intersection of
distribution teams, consumers, sales teams, promoters and the product at the retail outlet.
The study was guided by the following research objective: To assess the critical factors in
retail measurement for strategic marketing of FMCGs in Kenya. The research was
anchored by the game theory. The target respondents were marketing managers and
researchers who have previously or are currently investing in retail measurement. Out of
the 9 sampled marketing managers and 3 research managers; 6 marketing managers and
all the 3 research managers responded, representing a 75% response rate which was
considered adequate for the objective of the study. Primary data was mainly collected
using in-depth interviews that were administered by phone calls and one on one
scheduled interviews. Data was analyzed using content analysis. The results revealed that
most of the firms used similar metrics in retail measurement for strategic marketing but
used different strategies to gain a competitive edge depending on their market share and
financial capabilities. This implied an increase in popularity of retail audits among the
global FMCGs manufacturing companies in Kenya. Proper Planning, communication,
selection of service providers, definition of the region of coverage and identification of
measurable KPIs were found to be the most critical aspects considered in retail
measurement. The study thus concludes that global CPGs in Kenya are the major
investors in retail measurement with an inclination towards outsourcing of services as
opposed to local players who cite the cost of retail measurement and cost cutting as the
major impediment to extensive retail audits. The study also concludes that rigorous
competition is the greatest motivation for investing in retail measurement and the
counterfeits that flood the retail FMCG sectors in Kenya is a major setback to proper
estimation of markets share in relation to their production and projections of demand. The
study recommends that the government should put in place measures to bar counterfeit
products proliferation. Further, the local manufactures are encouraged to take a plunge
and invest in retail measurement to better compete locally and globally if necessary. This
will inspire the companies to even export more goods, thus improving their performance | en_US |