Effect of Direct Marketing on Consumer Product Uptake in Commercial Banks in Thika Town

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to determine the effect of direct marketing on consumer product uptake in commercial banks in Thika town. The study sought to establish the effect of social media marketing, face to face selling, email marketing and telemarketing on consumer product uptake. The study adopted a descriptive cross sectional survey design and targeted 18 commercial banks operating in Thika Town. Only 16 commercial banks were involved in the study. Two commercial banks were used for piloting. The unit of observation comprised of 10 customers operating with the each of the commercial banks involved in the study making a total of 160 respondents. Structured questionnaires were employed in data collection. Both inferential and descriptive statistics were employed in analyzing the collected data. MS Excel and SPSS software were used in generating the statistics. The results of the study were presented in form of tables and figures. The findings of the study established that directing marketing practices such as social media marketing, face to face selling and telemarketing positively and significantly affect the levels of consumer product uptakes amongst commercial banks operating in Thika Town. The study however established that email market positively but insignificantly affects consumer product uptakes among the commercial banks. The study also recommends that the commercial banks operating in Thika Town should focus on enhancing their face to face selling practices since the practice positively and significantly affects the levels of consumer product uptakes. The study recommends that the commercial banks operating in Thika Town should focus on enhancing their telemarketing practices since the practice positively and significantly affects the levels of consumer product uptakes.