| dc.description.abstract | Marketing writers often emphasize the universality of the
marketing process as it applies to all organizations in our
society, whether profit or not-for-profit, government or private,
professional or nonprofessional, international or national,
industrial or consumer-products companies.
The not-for-profit sector constitutes an important economic
sector consisting of "a wide variety. of organizations including
universities, charitable organizations, hospitals, government
agencies, and foundations.
The study reported here was an exploratory study whose
objective was to find out the extent of the use of marketing"
tools in Not-For-Profit Organizations, with special reference to
Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in Kenya.
The data was collected by use of a structured and nondisguised
questionnaire. The questionnaires were administered
on a "drop-and-pick-Iater" basis where possible while the rest
were mailed "to the respondents. Eighty-one organizations were
surveyed of which fifty-one responded.
According to the findings of this study, most administrators
of the NGOs seem to believe that marketing is a process peculiar/
to business organizations. Indeed, this came out very clearly
in some of the notes that accompanied the questionnaires that
were mailed back blank. One of the respondents, for example,
had written: "We are sorry your questionnaire is not relevant
to our organization since we are not a business enterprise.
Another had written "We are a charity organization, we cannot
be involved in marketing •••" Clearly, the notes suggest that
the attitude of the administrators is that marketing is not
only inapplicable but also a process to be shunned by Not-For-
Profit Organizations.'
Indeed, the extent of the use of marketing planning and
development of new products/services were found to be very rare. Advertising in various media types was also found to be very
.rare. One interesting finding was that religious organizations
use marketing tools more extensively than educational institutions.
In general, the extent of the use of marketing in NGOs )
was found to be very limited. There is therefore need to
educate the administrators, on what marketing is all about and
.show them that the goals and problems of Not-For~Profit
Organizations can be dealt with most effectively by applying
marketing approaches. | en |
