ASSESSMENT OF MARKETING STRATEGY PRACTICES AT NATIONAL OIL ETHIOPIA BY: ANSUAR ADEM

Abstract

One of the core activities in Business Company to stay in a business is having a well developed marketing strategy. The crucial success or failure a company depends on its marketing strategy. Having this in mind, this study has been designed to assess the marketing strategy practices of National Oil Ethiopia (NOC). The main objective of the study was to assess the marketing strategy of National oil Ethiopia (NOC) and to identify whether it is aligned with the target marketing and marketing mix to satisfy customer requirements in particular to Lubricating oils. The study also helps to identify the major problems encountered to implement marketing strategies. Closed and open ended questionnaire along with interviews were used for the purpose of data collection. The selections of the respondents were carried out by using purposive sampling technique because it is believed that marketing department staffs have more exposure about the marketing activities of the company than other departments and the researcher took all the respondents marketing staff a total population of the study. Thus study concludes that NOC is not working well on the branding activities and the price of the products is higher than the competitors. And also the company is facing problems to implement the marketing strategies. Among the problems, Stiff price and service based competition from existing and new entrants, Difficulty to secure land to expand retail network in Addis Ababa and in main Regional towns, Absence of quality checking authority, High investment cost of pumps and underground tankers and Entry of new competitors with cheaper price. In general, the researcher recommends that the company would be strong competitor in the market by positioned its products in the customers mind through an intensive work on branding and if it is possible adjusting the price by