Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The culture-specific context refers to how the product is used and perceived in different cultural settings. This culture-
specific context often manifests itself in the tone of voice, product image, or emotional brand attributes. For instance,
if you look at the attribute ‘glamorous’, you will see that its relative popularity differentiates strongly across different
markets (figure 1). This can have a strong effect on your communication’s tone of voice for brands and products
where a glamorous image plays an important role – think of fashion or spirits, for example
Knowing the similarities and differences will also help you set up a more effective marketing organization to manage
your brand and teams across markets and manage potential marketing conflicts that often arise between your central
international marketing organization and your local marketing organizations. More on that in step 7.
The fact that there are social and cultural differences between countries is often acknowledged, however, the social,
cultural, and lifestyle differences within a country, less so. We have learned through experience that these social-
cultural or lifestyle differences within a country are often just as large or even larger than the differences between
countries. Figure 2 shows consumers’ attitudes to making the effort to eat healthy across three European markets.
The figure also shows that, while there are important differences between these three markets, the differences
between consumer groups within local markets are even more relevant.
Knowing this information can help you build target audiences across markets as there is a good chance that you will
find similar target audiences in different markets. For instance, the ‘creatives’ mentioned in Figure 2 have similar
attitudes and values in all three markets
Each situation requires different marketing strategies and tactics. You should allow for flexibility in your overall
marketing strategy and be able to influence the amount of (de)centralization of your brand in a particular market.
Or you come to the slow realization that your distributor does not give your brand the attention it deserves because
your sales are too small or they’re planning to launch a competitive brand themselves. Or perhaps that your
distributor is too small to have any negotiating power and sales know-how to get you into the large retailers.
The act of sharing market information in itself is part of this management process. In many cultures, like in some
Eastern European, ex-communist countries, information is seen as a source of power that needs to be controlled, and
will only be fully shared once a person, like the global marketing manager, has earned that trust. Trust, in such
environments, is not given immediately as opposed to North-Western Europe and the Anglo-Saxon world, where trust
is first given and can be withdrawn after it has been broken. In many other cultures, trust first needs to be earned
before it is given.