Promoting Bank Usage Habits in Africa’s Savings Mobilization Programs: A Strategic Marketing Perspective

Abstract

Despite widespread liberalization of savings mobilization marketing systems in African economies, consumers continue to rely more heavily on informal financial services than formal financial services, within these systems. The authors draw on habit theory and the strategic marketing framework to develop a rural, customer-centric marketing (CCM) model for promoting rural savings programs in the Sub-Saharan African (SSA) context. Results based on data from Ghana’s savings mobilization program show that under the current, liberalized policy regime, formal financial institutions generate a more significant relative advantage than informal financial arrangements. Of the four customer-centric marketing activities (i.e., service affordability, accessibility, acceptability, and awareness), consumers only viewed service affordability as generating a relative disadvantage. Relatedly, only service affordability positively influenced savings likelihood, while service accessibility negatively influenced the bank usage habit. The results confirm that the customer-centric marketing approach effectively identifies which service inducements promote the bank usage habit in Africa’s savings mobilization programs.