Marketing-Mix of Online Social Lending Websites

Abstract

With the rise of microfinance in developing countries and its evolution to a business model in developed nations, microfinance has fully transitioned to the internet, taking the distinctive form of social lending. However, the marketing trends of emerging peer-to-peer micro-lending websites have been largely unexplored during its rise to recognition due to most studies focusing on financial, economic, political and humanitarian issues in context to microfinance. However, based on a sample of eight popular social lending websites, this paper uses cases to analyze the marketing elements of these sites to better understand how they function and to predict the future.