Midterm Exam Subject: International marketing Student: Pham Thanh Hang - MA KREMS 2 Question 1: Discuss the reasons why international business is much more complex today that it was twenty years ago? Reasons: 1. Global competi competition tion and fiecer fiecer competit competitive ive pressure pressure (Number (Number of competitors competitors increases, Growth in relative size of firms, Competition urgency in terms of research and development, procurement, manufacturing and marketing) 2. Internet Internet revolution: revolution: The internet internet and electroni electronicc commerce commerce are are bringing bringing major major structure changes to the way companies operate worldwide. 3. Higher Higher educ educatio ational nal leve levell custom customers ers 4. Higher income income:: People with with higher higher incomes incomes desires desires for material material positions, positions, ways ways of spending leisure time and aspirations for the future. 5. Fascinating Fascinating phenomeno phenomenon n like marketing marketing around around the world world and increa increasing sing number number of companies interrelated. 6. Cust Custom omer er beha behavio viour urss chang changee 7. Political Political and economics economics events changing changing environm environment ent (economic (economicss agreements, agreements, deregulation and privatization, emerging markets) 8. Customers Customers have have a wider and more divergent divergent “choice “choice set” of goods and and services services to choose from. 9. Different Different cultures cultures and and globalisation: globalisation: They They do not suffocate suffocate local local culture culture but rather rather liberates them from the ideaological conformity of nationalism, with consumers becoming more receptive to new things. Question 2: Under what conditions should companies pursue universal market segments? Companies pursue universal market segments in order to identify target, serve effectively the most attractive segments. It also help to tailor marketing mix to the needs of each segment and satisfy better the needs of the segment. Conditions: 1. Incom Incomee leve levels ls of cus custom tomer erss 2. Difference Differencess in material material life: differ differences ences in in the level level and type of of demand demand 3. Differ Different ent langua languages ges and and social social interact interaction ion 4. Differ Different ent religi religions ons and and educati educational onal leve levell 5. Valu Valuee sy system stemss
Question 3: what challenges do current creators and information providers face due to the advent and popularity of electronic media? Are current mechanism to protect their rights? Due to the advent and populartity of electronic media, current creators and information providers have to face with many challenges. Any negative information can be speaded quickly worldwide just after some minutes. Moreover, any strategy or programs made by them can be imitated and lose copyright. In the mean time, they also suffer from much pressure to renew their programs to defeat their rivals and avoid distorting information. There are many mechanisms issued to protect their rights. However, current mechanism does not act very effectively when they can not prevent translation, transliteration equipvalent and piracy products from creaters and information providers. Question 4: Certain Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia do not allow advertisers to show frontal picture of a woman with her hair. This creates a challenge for companies like Unilever or Procter and Gamble that want to advertise hair care products (e.g shampoo). How do you tackle this challenge? Some interesting explanation for this. In Islamic, there is one word that all the women have to memorize: AURAH. (In English: Aurat). What is aurah and why they have to memorize it? "aurah" in Arabic means shame and humility. And basically it means certain part of the body that we need to cover from others to see.
Aurat for man and woman is different. For men, the part where they have to close is between the navel untill the lower part of their knee. For women, they have to close all part of their body except their face and their wrist. To cover aurat, people wear Hijab in Arab Saudi Countries. In Malaysia, Indonesia…, women wear Tudung. Both Hijab and Tudung are like one kind of scalf, which can help women cover their hair. The requirement for women to cover aurat in Muslim countries has been creating a lot of obstacles and challenges for cosmetic company such as Unilever, Procter & Gamble in Marketing some products like shampoo. Conventionally, talking about shampoo advertisement, we will think of “Thick waves of hair cascade over a woman’s shoulder. She gives a flirtatious flick of her locks and tells viewers that they too can get such a luxurious mane — if they buy the shampoo she is holding up to the camera”. That is the script for your standard shampoo commercial. That’s the reason for decades, many Western companies failed to appreciate the unique needs of Muslim consumers. Worse, some companies offended potential customers by not understanding religious sensitivities. But as the Islamic population has grown in size and affluence — there are now 2.04 billion Muslims worldwide — more multinationals are seeking to tap into the market.
The most famous example of that case is NIKE. Nike committed a legendary error when it released a pair of athletic shoes in 1996 with a logo on the sole that some Muslims believed resembled the Arabic lettering for Allah. Given that Muslims consider the feet unclean, “producing shoes with the name of God on the soles of the feet is not a good idea,” said Mr. Goodman, who converted to Islam in 1999. “They recalled 800,000 pairs of shoes globally.” Instead of simply importing products and advertising from the West, companies are increasingly developing marketing campaigns — and formulating products themselves — with Muslims firmly in sight. Marketing experts call it “Islamic marketing” or “usage of the notion of localization” and “rule No.1 is to avoid causingoffense.” That’s the way multinational companies are using to tackle this sensitive matter. To conclude, there are many solutions but in this exam I can give some examples only: Example 1: In order to deal with this matter, companies can choose the indirect advertising method. It means that instead of showing women’s hair to advertise hair care products, they can use a picture of a typical muslim woman but uncomfortable feeling and looks sleepy tired because she could not sleep well last night. After being introduced a hair shampoo, now she looks fresh and actively. Example 2: Direct advertisement of a shampoo with its prominent characteristics: no scalf, super smooth and silky…In this case, Muslim women does not need to show their hair because the advertising program concentrate on products and its features only. Recently, in Malaysia, there is one Advertisement which become a hot topic throughout the countries. That is the advertisement of Sunsilk Lively Clean & Fresh shampoo. In the advertisement, there is no hair shown. But the advertisement still appeals the attention of people because of the confidence of the actress after she uses the shampoo. The shampoo addresses on the different value: inner beauty. Another example to show how cosmetic companies tackle the challenge of Islamic culture is Hijab Shampoo. Hijab Shampoo means for women who cover their heads tightly in hijab that leaves their faces exposed. It was created for people who suffer from oily scalps after wearing any head covering, be it a baseball hat or head scarf. After company research showed that many women who wear the tudung complained of oily scalps, it introduced the television commercial aimed at them.
