Digital Marketing: The use and development in Nigeria

Bc. Femi Micheal Awolesi, BSc

Master's thesis

Abstract:

This study aims to study the current state of the use and development of digital marketing in Nigeria using SMEs as case study. Descriptive cross-sectional research design was adopted to collect data from SMEs across the states in Nigeria using a semi-structured questionnaire that was electronically administered and retrieved. A total of 150 SMEs participated in this study comprising of 61.3% male and 38.7% female. Most of the SMEs identified as sole proprietorship (75%) and were categorized as financial services, education, manufacturing, wholesale/retail trade, accommodation and food services and IT services. 30.7% of the SMEs used email marketing to a moderate extent, 40% of them used mobile marketing to a moderate extent, 48.7% of the sampled SMEs in Nigeria used social media marketing to a very great extent, 34.7% of them used SEO to a moderate extent, 47.3% of the SMEs used PPC to a moderate extent as a form of digital marketing in their businesses and 34% of the sample size used online advertisements to a moderate extent. The result of regression analysis of the impact of digital marketing on sales of SMEs in Nigeria revealed that the use of e-mail digital strategy (β = 0.087, t = 0.916, p < 0.05), social media marketing as digital marketing strategy (β = 0.099, t = 1.227, p < 0.05) and pay-per-click (β = 0.142, t = 1.435, p < 0.05) exerts a positive and significant effect on sales improvement of the SMEs. The study therefore concludes that digital marketing has positive impact on sales of SMEs in Nigeria. The analysis also leads to conclusion that the relevant digital marketing options to SMEs include e-mail, social media, search engine optimization, pay-per-click and online advertising. Meanwhile, the impact of digital marketing options on sales improvement is more positive through e-mails, social media marketing and pay-per-click. The SMEs in Nigeria are greatly constrained by challenges of finance, and lack of sufficient knowledge of digital marketing.

Keywords

Digital Marketing, SMEs, email Marketing, social media, SEO, pay-per-click, online advert, sales improvement

Language used: English

Date on which the thesis was submitted / produced: 31. 3. 2022

Thesis defence

• Supervisor: Ing. Petr Benda, Ph.D.

Czech University of Life Sciences Prague

Faculty of Economics and Management

Master programme / field:
Economics and Management / Economics and Management