AN ANALYSIS OF COMPETITIVE STRATEGIES EMPLOYED IN MICROFINANCE INSTITUTIONS: A CASE OF KENYA WOMEN FINANCE TRUST

Abstract

Purpose: The study sought to examine competitive strategies employed in microfinance institutions using a case study of Kenya Women Finance Trust

Methodology: The study adopted descriptive case study design. The sample size was thirty respondents from a target population of one hundred and one respondents. The research used both stratified random sampling and purposive sampling methods. The research study used questionnaires and interview schedules to collect data. Data was analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20 and Microsoft Excel 2007.

Results: The research findings indicated that KWFT used several competitive strategies so as to be at a competitive edge in the market, the majority being geographical expansion strategy, market and product development, improved marketing methods and differentiation strategy. The use of these competitive strategies in KWFT had several contributions such as the organization’s ability to be at competitive edge by being able to retain customers and also by achieving high profits for an organization. The various challenges that affected the use of competitive strategies included financial challenges and lack of skilled personnel to formulate and implement the competitive strategies.

Unique contribution to theory, practice and policy: It recommended that KWFT should use more of differentiation strategy as this was mentioned as being the least used strategy. This is important because products are differentiated in ways that will appeal on a variety of customers and thus creating customer loyalty which will eventually lead to competitive advantage for KWFT. It was also recommended that KWFT should be able to retain those employees that have been involved in crafting competitive strategies in the organization. KWFT should also employ high skilled personnel especially in the field of competitive strategy, reserve finances for competitive strategy formulation and train employees on competitive strategies so as to counter the challenges that were identified in the study.