Promotional Strategies and Insurance Companies Performance: A Survey of COGEAR in Kigali-Rwanda

This study was driven by the concerns about the effects of global changes in the business environment and COGEAR in particular. The general objective of the study was to assess the impact of the promotional strategies on the performance of insurance companies using a survey of COGEAR in Kigali-Rwanda. The specific objectives included: to identify promotional strategies used in the insurance sector, to assess organizational performance of insurance sector and to determine the relationship between promotional strategies and organizational performance in the insurance sector. The researcher adopted a descriptive approach to illustrate the impact of promotional strategies on insurance companies‟ performance benchmarking on COGEAR. This was achieved through use of questionnaire and interview guide to collect data from a sample of 393 customers which was arrived at using simple random sampling technique. Data collected was further processed and analyzed using Excel sheets to come up with conclusions and recommendations in relation to the study. The study showed that promotional strategies are one of the approaches with a legitimate contribution to insurance company’s performance. However, these must be articulated with other core business resources such as human resources to attain effectiveness and efficiency as core objectives. The findings from the study showed that pillars of promotional strategies (advertising, sales promotion, personal selling and public relations) in insurance industry are recommended because they contribute considerably to the performance of the insurers. 62% of respondents confirmed that they came to know insurance services through promotional strategies. Finally the study concluded that promotional strategies alone cannot lead to insurance company’s’ performance; cooperation with other institutions like banks, brokerage firms and garages is recommended. The issues of dynamic competition, customer satisfaction and individual learning and development must be considered within changing business environment