GLOBAL MARKETING STRATEGIES

Global Marketing Strategies

Global Marketing Strategies

Introduction

Global marketing research is intended to aid marketing decisions involving more than one country. The research can involve global products, large multinational companies active in several countries, or smaller companies interested in new export markets. Global marketing research may involve routine yearly forecasting of sales of different products in many established markets, or decisions concerning the introduction of a product successful in one country into another country, or why a product's success varies from country to country. Although the same methods are used as in domestic marketing research, the Global marketing research process is complicated by extra problems.

The marketing environment varies from country to country. This is particularly true of the governmental, legal, economic, and cultural environments, and secondary research (see secondary data) will have to be carried out on these environments. This immediately multiplies the amount of search for relevant secondary data, and sources outside the domestic country will be needed. The potential for problems with secondary data is greater with Global research than for domestic research. The level of information will vary with the informational environment, definitions vary from country to country; indeed, different sources frequently give different values for the same variables, e.g., country A's figure for its imports from country B will differ from country B's figure for its exports to country A. The level of accuracy may be expected to be better in developed countries than in developing countries. Data on national income based on tax returns will be affected by differing tax regimes and attitudes toward tax evasion.

Qualitative research becomes important in Global marketing research as it is more likely that ignorance of foreign markets means that more exploratory research is needed. It may be difficult to recruit trained personnel with knowledge of both qualitative research methods and the culture and language of the country under study.

Survey research offers two types of problems relating to sampling and questionnaire design, respectively. Sampling problems include difficulties in population definition and the lack of suitable sampling frames, which make it difficult to relate any sample results to a population. Low levels of telephone penetration or poor postal systems and low literacy levels may make telephone surveys or postal surveys impractical in developing countries. High transport costs in some countries may mean personal interviews are confined to urban areas. On the other hand, personal interviewing may be more economic in lower-wage countries. Response rates depend upon cultural factors such as differing attitudes toward privacy, greater reluctance in some communities to communicate with strangers, and different attitudes toward some products such as food, personal hygiene, and alcohol.

Questionnaire problems begin with language problems. Language varies from country to country and in some countries several languages are spoken in different areas. Some words may have different meanings in different countries using the same language. Direct translation of a questionnaire from one language to another by a bilingual translator is frequently used. A translation needs to be checked by such means as back-translation, whereby the translated questionnaire ...