Ardismg

Buyer behavior differs among nations and often among market segments within a country. Marketers must carefully match their marketing strategies to local customs, tastes, and living conditions. Even McDonald’s decided to tweak its standard hamburger fare to cater to diverse international tastes. The world’s largest fast-food marketer offers vegetarian burgers in parts of India; some Australian outlets include beets as a condiment; beer can be purchased in German outlets; and wine is on the menu in French McDonald’s restaurants.
The Coca-Cola Company, which generates 63 percent of sales and 75 percent of total profits from international markets, varies its product emphasis in different parts of the world. In
Japan, it heavily promotes Leaf, a new canned-tea product that has become a hot seller there.
The reason for the shift: Soft drinks make up only 20 percent of nonalcoholic beverage sales in Japan. TelePizza is another international venture that adapted its products to local preferences and customs. Founder Leopoldo Fernandez Pujals exemplifies today’s international entrepreneurial ventures. Pujals is Cuban-born, American reared and educated, a Vietnam veteran, and now a businessman based in Madrid, Spain. Ten years ago, Pujals invested $100,000 in savings to launch his new business, TelePizza. Using local teenagers to test his pies, he determined the best combination of ingredients for his market before opening the doors for business. TelePizza now controls 60 percent of Spain’s pizza market and has grown to more than 600 outlets in Europe and South America. Many of his strategies have been based on previous winners in the international fast-food industry—cleanliness from McDonald’s, speedy home delivery from Domino’s, and sit-down comforts from Pizza Hut. Using a centralized delivery service and computerized ordering systems, customers can call one number to order anything from shrimp curry to pizza topped with trout flakes and have it delivered by bicycle to their door.
In some instances, international marketers succeed in changing local buyer behavior by introducing new marketing strategies that have been well-received in other countries. Johnson & Johnson (J&J) recently debuted RoC, a 40-year-old French line of skincare products, in an attempt to leverage its strong European brand. J&J marketers are targeting both the mass- market brand of L’Oreal and prestige department-store brands such as Clinique)Failure to adapt to local preferences can create costly problems, as Kellogg cereal marketers can attest. Kellogg had enjoyed success in both the United States and England and was eager to expand into other European markets. Lured by expected higher prices and profit margins, cheaper television advertising time, and fewer competitors, Kellogg opened a manufacturing plant in Italy to supply what appeared to be a market with high growth potential. But Italians do not eat corn flakes; they consider corn a product more likely to be fed to livestock; and those few cereal fanciers typically buy from health-food stores. Had Kellogg marketers bothered to check consumption data, they would have known the task they faced. On average, Italians consume 1.1 pounds of cereal annually—hardly a drop in the bucket compared to 11.7 pounds in the United States and 14.5 pounds in Britain. The U.S. firm began making inroads in the land of la Dolce Vita and then began linking its products to Italian food habits. For example, an ad for Crunchy Nut Corn Flakes features an Italian farm family eating breakfast outside their old stone house while their child is talking on a cell phone—an essential part of 21st-century Italian life. Eventually, Kellogg’s market share floated up to 60 percent of Italy’s total dry—cereal sales.
Differences in buying patterns require marketing executives to complete considerable research before entering a foreign market. Sometimes the marketer’s own organization or a U.S.- based research firm can provide needed information. In other cases, only a foreign-based marketing research organization can tell marketers what they need to know. Whoever conducts the research, investigators must focus on six different areas before advising a company to enter a foreign market:
1. Demand. Do foreign consumers need the company’s good or service?
2. Competitive environment. How do supplies currently reach the market?
3. Economic environment. What is the state of the nation’s economic health?
4. Social-cultural environment. How do cultural factors affect business opportunities?
5. Political-legal environment. Do any legal restrictions complicate entering the market?
6. Technological environment. To what degree are technological innovations used by consumers in the market?