Scanning and

Monitoring Global
Marketing Environment
 Environmental Scanning

The purpose of the scan is the identification of

opportunities and threats affecting the global
business for making strategic business decisions.
As a part of the environmental scanning process,
the organization collects information regarding
its environment and analyzes it to forecast the
impact of changes in the environment. This
eventually helps the management team to make
informed decision globally.
Important Factors for Environmental Scanning
• (i) Events
These are specific occurrences which take
place in different environmental sectors of a
business. These are important for the
functioning and/or success of the business.
Events can occur either in the internal or the
external environment. Organizations can
observe and track them.
• (ii) Trends
As the name suggests, trends are general
courses of action or tendencies along which
the events occur. They are groups of similar or
related events which tend to move in a
specific direction. Further, trends can be
positive or negative. By observing trends, an
organization can identify any change in the
strength or frequency of the events suggesting
a change in the respective area.
(iii) Issues
In wake of the events and trends, some
concerns can arise. These are Issues.
Organizations try to identify emerging issues
so that they can take corrective measures to
nip them in the bud. However, identifying
emerging issues is a difficult task. Usually,
emerging issues start with a shift in values or
change in which the concern is viewed.
(iv) Expectations
Some interested groups have demands based
on their concern for issues. These demands
are Expectations.
Monitoring Global Marketing Environment
The Global market environment is dynamic it is
always changing. Whether the forces of the Global
market environment fluctuate slowly or rapidly, they
create uncertainty, obstacles, and opportunities.
International Marketers must constantly monitor the
marketing environment to be prepared to capitalize
on opportunities and minimize adverse conditions.
To monitor changes in the marketing environment
effectively, marketing managers must engage in
environmental scanning and analysis.
Environmental Analysis
Environmental analysis is the process of assessing and
interpreting the information gathered through environmental
scanning. A manager reviews the information for accuracy,
ties to reconcile inconsistencies in the data, and interprets
the findings. Analysis allows a marketing manager to discern
changes in the environment and, if possible, or predict future
changes. By evaluating these changes, a marketing manager
should be able to determine possible threats and
opportunities associated with environmental fluctuations.
Knowledge of current and predicted environmental changes
aids a marketing manager in assessing the performance of
current marketing efforts and in developing marketing
strategies for the future.
Approaches for Responding to Environmental Forces
In responding to environmental forces, International
marketers use one of two general approaches. In the first
approach, International marketing managers view the forces
of the marketing environment as uncontrollable. According
to this traditional approach, an organization can do little to
alter the influence of the taking this reactive approach tries
to prepare itself to respond quickly to changes in the
environment. For example, although an organization has
little power to alter economic conditions new regulations, or
the actions of competitors, it can monitor the environment
closely and adjust its marketing strategy to counter the
effects of inflation, a new product safety law, or product
improvements by competitors.
A second response to the International marketing
environment is to take a proactive, or aggressive, stance
toward environmental forces. A growing number of
marketing professionals argue that the forces of the
marketing environment can be controlled, at least to some
extent. They believe that marketing itself represents a
significant force that can be used to create change and
extend its influence over the environment. Through
lobbying, legal action, advertising of key issues, and public
relations, organizations can alter some environmental
forces. For instance, a firm can control its competitive
environment by using aggressive pricing or competitive
advertising strategies to influence the decisions of rival
firms.