Marketing to Multicultural Audiences - Essay Example

?Marketing to Multicultural Audiences Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Introduction 3 Critical Issues Faced by Managers 4 Ethical Issues 5 OtherIssues 6 Solutions to the Issues: Best Practices and Theories 8 Best Practices 8 Theories 11 For Examples 13 Ethical Implications of Multicultural Marketing 14 Conclusion 16 References 17 Introduction Marketing to multicultural audiences indicates the marketing process adhered by a company while marketing its products or services to different cultures or ethnic groups. It is also known as “Multicultural Marketing” (Rosario, 2008). In the present day context, when business entities are widely tending to operate internationally and reach various ethnic groups in order to strengthen and stimulate their market position, the phenomenon of multicultural marketing emerges to be quite crucial. It is due to the reason that the values and choices of different cultures are extensively unparallel and a single product or service with it common features are somewhat inefficient to satisfy the needs of these ethnic groups. For instance, the failure of Walt Disney’s marketing strategy adapted especially focussing on the Eastern Region comprising of Mainland China and Hong Kong was due to the company’s misinterpretations of the cultural diversities of these two economies. To be included, both the cultures enjoy vacations for two-three days during the Lunar New Year which was categorised as the special days by the company. In this case, the company issued large number of discount tickets to both the ethnic groups in 2006. This incidentally increased the number of eligible customers to an amount which was uncontrollable by the company and therefore headed to a dramatic failure of the company’s marketing scheme (Bradsher, 2006). Apart from Walt-Disney, there are numerous companies operating in the multicultural market which have faced various issue related to the concept of multicultural marketing. Therefore, the paper shall intend to identify the various aspects of multicultural marketing with references to various cases regarding the failures and successes of various companies in executing their marketing strategies while targeting different cultures. The paper shall in this regard aim at suggesting some noteworthy and beneficial strategic recommendations in order to increase the viability of the thought in its realistic practices. Critical Issues Faced by Managers Evidences reveal that marketing is not the same as it was according to the traditional notions. Today, marketing has grown to be much wider and complex in its realistic practices accumulating numerous variables ranging from the customers’ income level to their needs and their cultures as well. It is due to the fact, that marketing at present is all about serving the customers according to their needs and choices in order to gain a certain amount of profit and achieve the optimum organisational goal. Therefore, it is quite essential for a marketer to know the targeted market, i.e. its cultural perceptions along with the economic values. It is in this context that managers, as marketers and leaders of an organisation face certain major issues while executing their marketing strategies focussing on a multicultural paradigm (Trompenaars & Woolliams, 2004). Ethical Issues Ethical challenges are one of the major issues faced by the managers in order to serve their ultimate customer group in a multicultural market. There are various influencing factors affecting the strategic philanthropy of multicultural marketing active in the given business environment of an organisation. Notably, globalisation is one such factor influencing the strategic decisions of marketers in virtue of multicultural dimensions. For instance, the total amount of world trade was recorded to grow more than six times from 1950 to 2000. As a result, the annual outflow of FDI increased to a record height of $1.3 trillion in the year 2000. This certain fact depicts the expansion of business in global terms and its long-lasting affect on the organisations’ well-being, especially operating in multicultural environment. Consequently, differing business environments caused various issues, one of the foremost being the ethical dilemmas (Yucel & Et. Al., 2009). Considering the various features of the international business, it is quite apparent that differing culture will generate differing point of views beside differing values and preferences among the ethnic groups. In other words, which is correct and appropriate for one culture may not be termed justifiable in another culture. Therefore, marketers need to adapt separate unique strategies for two separate ethnic groups which raise the issues of ethical attitudes perceived by the marketing managers (Torres, 2006). Worth mentioning in this context, the marketing strategy of BiDil which is termed to be “the first race-specific drug” manufactured by NitroMed Inc., an US based pharmaceutical company is a remarkable example to illustrate the ethical attitude of marketers in respect to the multicultural business environment. In this case, the company marketed its product, i.e. BiDil as a drug to fight heart diseases targeting the specified group of African American only. Thereby, the marketing strategies were termed to be unethical by many researchers which would in the near future give rise to racial discrimination at large (ICMR India, 2006). Other Issues Therefore, it can be stated that ethical issues largely influence the decision making process executed by a manager in terms of marketing to multicultural audiences. However, in order to market the product or service to the multicultural audiences, the manager needs to focus on many other facts apart from the ethical issues. Such as the legal attributes of the target market, the competency level of the market, and primarily the tastes and preferences of the targeted audiences. To be included, many economies or markets have a well-defined legal constitution to regulate and control the marketing affairs of various business entities. In many of the economies, the legal attributes are yielding and are somewhat ineffective to control the marketing interactions, i.e. advertisements, product designing, and other promotional activities. For instance, comparative advertisements are prohibited in Germany while it does not face any such prohibitions in the US or in the Indian market. Moreover, the audio-visual advertisement is restricted to 32 seconds of time period during evening in Kuwait, whereas it is permissible in other economies. This reveals the fact that marketing managers need to abide various legal issues in order to attain a level of sustainability in the international market (Yucel & Et. Al., 2009). Therefore, it is not only the ethical challenges that the marketing managers face but also the strategic factors which influence the ultimate decision making. Conversely, the effect of all these variables, such as legal, environmental, political and economical, can be summarised to influence the ethical well-being of the organisation on the whole. Illustrating the fact, if an organisation promotes its product or service through the audio-visual mass-media for more than 32 seconds in Kuwait, it shall be termed as unethical by the Kuwaitis, but shall not be the same from the point of view of a European. Thus, the foremost challenge faced by any and every marketer is the ethical well-being in the given context of multicultural marketing. Solutions to the Issues: Best Practices and Theories The concept of multicultural marketing is relatively a fresh thought in the management perspective. Despite, it presents a large number of best practices to be referred in order to develop an appropriate strategic alliance. But the concept lacks in forecasting some noteworthy tailored theories especially concentrated on the issue related to the concept. However, the most relevant and significant best practices are illustrated and some beneficial theories will be elaborated in the further discussion of the paper with due consideration to the phenomenon of multicultural marketing. Best Practices Some examples of best practices regarding the context can be well identified long before even the concept. ‘Multicultural Marketing’ was developed. To be illustrated, Pepsi in early 1940s implied a strategy to hire black salesmen to market its product in various parts of North America as an aggressive marketing strategy against the Coca-Cola Company. This particular strategy was executed by the then company president Mr. Walter S. Mack in order to face the competition in the multicultural market of America. This certainly resulted as a beneficial strategy influencing the cultural preferences in favour of the product (Cole, 2007). Other than Pepsi, the case of P&G can also be termed as a remarkable instance in the list of best practices related to multicultural marketing. In this case, after the company initiated a detailed research work based on the perceptions possessed by the different ethnic groups of America, it was revealed that African American women spent a larger amount of their earnings on beauty products than compared to the spending of other general females. This influenced the company to enforce a strategic campaign titled “My Black is Beautiful”, with an aim to create an impulse on the ethnic group comprising of African American women (Martin, 2009). Another quite interesting case is related to Mattel, the manufacturer and the marketer of famous Barbie dolls. It was in late 1950s when the company launched its Barbie dolls in its international targeted market. By the early 1980s, the company had launched a variety of Barbie dolls representing the African American, Asian, and Latinos, i.e. three unparallel cultures as a multicultural marketing strategy. However, the strategic attempt of the company witnessed several controversial remarks, claiming that the body of the white Barbie was coloured to represent the separate ethnic groups. These controversies leaded the company to introduce its first African doll, Christie followed by other two ethnic dolls, Kira representing the Asian race and Theresa representing the Latino culture (Memoire Online, 2010). The practices of marketing strategies, focussed on ethnic groups, can not only be witnessed in the case of beverage companies or in the case of health care or amusement products but it can also be witnessed in the case of beauty products as well. For instance, L’Oreal, which is remarked as one of the French world leading manufacturers and marketers of beauty products, is also recognised as experts of ethnic marketing. The company marketers after realising the virtue of ethnic marketing decided to purchase Softsheen Products Inc., a renowned producer of hair products tailored according to the perceptions of the targeted ethnic groups in 1998. In 2000, the company again purchased another company specialised in cosmetics manufacturing with due consideration to various ethnic groups. L’Oreal’s ethnic marketing can also be noticed evidently in their advertisement campaigns highlighting three women representing three ethnic groups, i.e. Asian, Caucasian, and Black ((Memoire Online, 2010). Hence, the numerous multinational companies, irrespective of their related industry, adapt strategies to market their products or services to the targeted multicultural audiences in the above mentioned ways. In other words, to create an impulse on the targeted customer groups and attain a higher level of competency in the international and multicultural platform, marketers are increasing tending towards multicultural marketing. However, this requires a certain amount of knowledge regarding the various aspects of a culture for which some relevant theories can be highly beneficial e.g. the Hofstede’s Theory and the Schwartz’s Culture-Level Dimensions. Theories In Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory, Hofstede defines four major elements which can be identified in any and every cultures, i.e. Masculinity/Femininity, Power Distance, Individualism/Collectivism, and Uncertainty Avoidance. According to him, these four dimensions of a culture depict the nature of the human behaviour, their attitudes, and their decision making criteria. Therefore, the theory assists a marketer to understand a culture in depth and plan their marketing strategies accordingly. For instance, if a culture is identified to be collective, it is most likely that the perception of one individual shall be strongly influenced by others’. Thus, creating a strong impulse on a single representative shall be beneficial to market the product or service to other members of the ethnic group. This assumption works similarly in case of other ethnic groups which certainly increase the applicability of the theory in determining a marketing strategy for the multicultural audiences (Nieves & Et. Al., 2006). In this milieu, Schwartz predicted three bipolar facets commonly witnessed in different cultures. They are mastery against harmony, embeddedness against autonomy, and hierarchy against egalitarianism. According to Schwartz, these four dimensions affect the perceptions, the values and the social well-being of an individual belonging to a specific ethnic group. Therefore, identifying these three bipolar aspects of a given culture shall be highly advantageous in order to know the culture evidently. Similar to Hofstede, this theory also supports the marketers to recognise the various paradigms of different cultures and develop their strategies according to the differing perceptions (Nieves & Et. Al., 2006). Apart from these theories, the Distinctiveness Theory and the Speech Accommodation Theory can also be beneficial for a marketer. In this context, Distinctive Theory was introduced by McGuire and his colleagues in 1970s. According to the theory, an individual most likely will demonstrate a stronger ethnic identity with a limited number of members belonging to the similar ethnicity occurring within a given environment. This certain feature of an individual’s psychology affects their marketing responses at large. Therefore, the applicability of this theory holds a strong significance in determining the multicultural marketing strategies of a company (Cho & Et. Al., 2004). Correspondingly, the Speech Accommodation Theory assumes that the more parallel the marketing campaigns are targeted to the multicultural audiences, the more beneficial it is for the marketers. This can be implied through a common language application, i.e. if the targeted market comprises a greater proportion of Latin audiences, the advertisement campaigns can be organised in Latino to influence the targeted customer group. Hence, the theory relates directly to the marketing strategies commonly adapted by the company (Ostman & Et. Al., 2010). For Examples Despite of the theories and the references of some remarkable best practices, companies often make mistakes in implementing multicultural marketing strategies which ultimately leads to the failure of the marketer. To be illustrated, the marketing policies of Kellogg’s were witnessed to face a failure in India in 1994. Initially the company marketed products such as corn-flakes, wheat-flakes, basmati rice flakes, etc. Notably, according to the cultural preferences, majority of the Indians prefer sweet food items. But in their realistic practises, the company offered crispy flakes which to an extent were unable to dissolve sugar as they were to be served cold and not warm. According to the researchers, the company’s marketing strategies failed in India, due to the reason that the products rendered by the company were ineffective to match the breakfast habit of the ethnic group. Moreover, the pricing strategy of Kellogg’s also proved unfavourable in the beginning which forced the company to reform its marketing strategies with an accord to the cultural dimensions (Ashish & Et. Al., 2010). In another case of Levi’s jeans, the company was recorded to incur a down fall of almost US$4.3 billion in the year 2001. This failure of the company was also a result of poor multicultural strategy. To be mentioned, the company initiated numerous advertisement campaigns which were not at all preferred in the UK culture. Moreover, the cultural preferences during 2001 were tending favourably towards designer jeans which in turn affected the success of the brand. Apart from Levi’s many other brands were also recorded to fail in the UK market with the given reason of ineffective marketing strategies leaded by misunderstanding of the cultural preferences (Haig, 2005). Ethical Implications of Multicultural Marketing The attributes of multicultural marketing reveals the fact that a company whether operating in a particular nation or its operations are scattered equally to various geographical dimensions, needs to market its services and/or products to different cultural groups. In this milieu, different cultural groups refer separate preferences, values, beliefs, and perceptions which largely affect the marketing strategies adapted by a company. These marketing strategies may include various promotional activities ranging from advertisement campaigns to product redesigning. Evidences reveal that considering the unparallel preferences of different ethnic groups, companies have repeatedly focused on tailored marketing strategies to be implemented. Certainly it is due to this reason that companies often come across various ethical issues which require to be conquered in order to attain sustainable growth. In this regard a marketer can emphasise on various ethical implications suggested by experienced researchers and even according to their own individual learning. Conversely, according to Tinsley (2003), a marketer can apply three basic rules to avoid ethical obstacles while identifying various cultural attributes and designing their strategies accordingly. The three rules defined by the author are golden rule, silver rule, and the open forum rule. The golden rules in this context depict various stages in determining marketing strategies ranging from objectifying to researching, problem identification, problem solving and executing. Thus, it provides an unambiguous picture of the cultural heritage possessed by the targeted market to the market and strongly assists the marketer to plan his/her strategic alliance. As quoted by the author, golden rules tend to explain what the customers need. Similarly, in case of the silver rule legal attributes are in the focus which prevents unethical issues related to legal environment of the targeted market. Finally, the open forum rule guides the marketer to avoid implementing strategies which are against the television rule, i.e. to promote any statement unsatisfactorily. Thereby, the there rules can evidently minimise the ethical issues raised in the process of multicultural marketing in terms of customer preferences, legal factors, and promotional activities (Tinsley, 2003). Conclusion The concept of multicultural marketing refers to the managerial decision to market the products or services to a multicultural group of audience. From a comprehensive viewpoint, it can be stated that mostly the companies operating in the international market requires to focus on the issues related to multicultural marketing. But with an in depth analysis and with due consideration to the present phenomenon, even small enterprises operating only in a single economy faces the obstacles of multicultural marketing. It is due to the fact that local communities today also comprise of different ethnic groups. For instance, the American market is increasingly getting into focus due to its multicultural environment comprising ethnic groups such as Asians, Hispanics, and Caucasians. Therefore, it is quite evident that companies, irrespective of their size and/or industry should emphasise on multicultural marketing strategies to gain efficiency and an extra edge of competency. Conclusively, it can be stated that adapting and implementing multicultural strategies is a complex process which can give rise to many obstacles among which the ethical issues can be termed as one of the majors. Notably, as marketing is all about creating impulse, many companies witness failure due to the unethical behaviour in a given market. Thus, companies should also focus on their ethical implications to reduce such occurrences. In this regard, it would be beneficial for the company to imply various analysing tools such as the Hofstede’s theory or the Speech Accommodation Theory with an aim to identify the various aspects of a culture. Besides, the marketers should also emphasise on other general research tools to attain supremacy in determining multicultural marketing strategies. References Ashish, & Et. Al., 2010. Cultural Differences in Advertising & Marketing. Slide Share. [Online] Available at: http://www.slideshare.net/navinpamnani/cultural-differences-in-advertising-amp-marketing [Accessed February 09, 2011]. Bradsher, K., 2006. Disney Magic a Long Wait Away In Hong Kong. The New York Times. [Online] Available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/03/world/asia/03iht-disney.html [Accessed February 09, 2011]. Cole, Y., 2007. Multicultural Marketing? How PepsiCo Got it Started? Diversity Inc. [Online] Available at: http://diversityinc.com/content/1757/article/1129/ [Accessed February 09, 2011]. 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