REGIONAL COOPERATION AND ECONOMIC INTEGRATION

CEFTA-2006 AND ANHANCING COMPETITIVENESS OF THE REGION - SOME SECTORAL ASPECTS
the Mann-Whitney U test indicate that H 0
(Two independent samples are from the same
population) can be rejected and H 1
accepted at the significance level of p≤ 0.05 for 3
variables: VAR6, VAR7 and VAR9 (see Table 1).
Table 1: Selected results of Mann-Whitney U statistics for 3 variables
from section I
VAR00006 VAR00007 VAR00009
Mann-Whitney U 33,000 30,000 33,000
Wilcoxon W 111,000 85,000 88,000
Z -2,062 -2,562 -2,062
Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) ,039 ,010 ,039
Exact Sig. [2*(1-tailed
Sig.)]
,080(a) ,050(a) ,080(a)
Distribution of frequencies for the 3 variables in two independent samples reveals the
following differences in some characteristics of the role of marketing function between
Serbian companies and MNCs subsidiaries operating in Serbia:
1.
2.
3.
The marketing department counts less than 10 employees in 75% of Serbian
companies, while that is the case in 40% of sampled subsidiaries.
50% local companies conduct market research among other marketing
activities, while that is the usual activity within marketing department for all
MNCs subsidiaries.
70% of foreign companies deal with customers’ complaints, whereas only
25% of Serbian companies perform the same
Research evidence suggests that marketing department has not been yet fully developed in
Serbian companies. Larger marketing department implies that functions within it could be
more diversified and each individual could be more specialised for performing his tasks,
and therefore the whole department is more effective and productive. Consequently, the
lack of personnel who deal with customers’ complaints or conduct market researches in
Serbian companies is not surprising, regarding the fact that marketing departments are
smaller than those in MNCs subsidiaries.
It should be noted that traditionally marketing activities, such are sales and promotion are
equally present in both groups of companies. One interesting result from this part of the
analysis is that there is no statistically significant difference between Serbian and foreign
companies regarding other activities that are considered to be a part of marketing functions
(Jobber and Fahy, 1996). Actually, quality management, prices policy and distribution
management are disregarded in 70% of MNCs subsidiaries and 75% of domestic companies.
However, Public Relations (PR) are considered to be an integral part of a marketing
department in 90% of foreign and 67% of domestic companies.
Sections II and III, which examined the process of planning of marketing activities and the
structure of marketing costs, has been transformed into 17 different variables. The results
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