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Abstract

This thesis examines the role of marketing in British building societies by reference to the Marketing Concept.

The research investigates the degree of acceptance of the philosophy of the marketing concept, and the extent of its implementation by those societies who are members of the Building Societies Association.

The adoption of the marketing concept is inevitable for financial institutions if they are to survive competitive pressures in an environment now characterised by continual change. Given rapidly changing environmental conditions, marketing allows for a better matching of products and services to customer needs, improving the ability of firms to better withstand competitive pressures, whilst enabling firms to gain enhanced returns on capital invested.

This empirical study was conducted on the top 50 British building societies ranked in size by total assets. Data was collected either by way of questionnaire based interviews (Top 20) or postal questionnaires, from three respondent groups; Chief Marketing Executives, Chief Executive Officers, and Branch Managers.

The research findings show that major differences exist according to the size of building societies in their approach to marketing. The larger societies are in various stages of adopting the concept into their corporate culture and some are beginning the transition towards a market orientated organisation. However, in practice many societies still have not grasped the marketing concept and are continuing to operate from a sales or production orientation.

Differences in the understanding and the degree of orientation towards the marketing concept also varied across the three groups of respondents studied. Of the three groups, the Branch Managers were the least positively inclined towards the marketing concept.
In general, building societies continue to focus on the functional and promotional aspects of marketing rather than viewing it as a guiding philosophy. This is particularly true for the smaller societies.

Publication Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HG Finance
Departments:	Bayes Business School Bayes Business School > Bayes Business School Doctoral Theses Doctoral Theses

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