Factors Influencing Branding Strategy Among Commercial Banks in Kenya

Abstract

Brand management involves many aspects, and the most important aspect is to choose what kind of brand architecture because it’s not only a purely theoretical concept, but also an important management concept. If companies cannot confirm their own brand architecture, it will lead to misallocation of resources and chaos of marketing strategy. Therefore, establishing an effective brand strategy is essential for a company’s development. The researcher through prior study did not find research work where the focus was on factors affecting branding strategy among banks in Kenya. It is the above premise and research gap that the researcher is sought to fill. The objective of the study therefore was to establish the factors influencing branding strategy in the commercial banking industry in Kenya.In this study, a descriptive research design in form of a survey was used. The population of interest of this study was the 42 commercial banks that are operating in Kenya. The researcher conducted a census study of the whole population. Data was collected by use of questionnaires which were distributed to marketing managers or their equivalent in the marketing department in the banks. The correlations between different items that were used gave the impression that the most important thing when talking about brand awareness was to be “top of mind”. This implies that the most important thing for banks is to be on top of mind in the heads of their customers, since dealing with customers in banking is very much about retaining your customers and creating long-term relationships. The purpose of this research was to establish the factors influencing branding strategy within commercial banks in Kenya. The most important factors for branding strategy choice were related to the brand association, competition, and nature of product. The researcher established that there is an insignificant relationship between market size and branding strategy. An associative relationship between brand association, competition and branding strategy was the most important part according to the findings in this research. The study found that the most important factors for choice of bank branding strategy were related to the associations, competition, nature of product, and company resources. The study thus recommends that commercial banks should embrace personal relationship with the customers as an important part that will help in creating their brand association and increase the customer attitude towards their products.