MARKETING MANAGEMENT STRATEGY AND PERFORMANCE OF MANUFAC-TURING FIRMS IN SOUTH-SOUTH, NIGERIA

Abstract

The investigation addresses marketing management approach on performance in manufacturing firms in south-south, Nigeria with specific focus on the following dimensions of marketing management strategy; marketing orientation, innovation orientation and product orientation. This study used primary sources of data. The primary data were obtained with the aid of a questionnaire. The primary data was gotten from employees of the selected companies in south-south, Nigeria of a sample of 370 employees from the selected companies from a population of 4838 using Taro Yamane formula. The research instrument with the use of Cronbach alpha showed high reliability and the research instrument validity was evaluated utilizing content and face validity. Distributions of questionnaires to the respondents were done using stratified random sampling to select employees. The selected 370 employees were stratified into the category of department. Out of the total sample of 370 questionnaires served, 365 useable questionnaires were returned valid for analysis. Simple linear regression was employed in the testing of the hypotheses. The study revealed that marketing orientation, innovation orientation and product orientation have significant effect on business performance in manufacturing companies in South-South, Nigeria. The study recommended that emphasis should be placed on marketing, innovation and product orientation for an improve business performance.