International Expansion as a Major Driving Force - Research Proposal Example

MANAGEMENT DISSERTATION PROPOSAL PROFORMA Aims of the Dissertation: Globalization has allowed the companies to expand their territories crossing the national boundaries. Countries are welcoming the international companies to do business in their market in order to boost the employment opportunities and simultaneous economical growth. Many international companies nowadays see international expansion as a major driving force in their activities. Struggling for a success, emerging markets are seen as the newest components of the global market by the majority of the companies. Global market itself is a separate case that is worth mentioning. However each company has to face certain challenges when entering the new market and the high is seen for the strategy of entering those markets. Google Inc., which does good business in most parts of world, has achieved significant success in China in spite of government’s stringent policies and stiff competition in the market. This paper discusses the marketing methods and approaches adopted and used by the Google Inc. in China while entering the Chinese market and how did it manage to comply with the stringent policies related to users’ confidentiality. On July 15, 2005 the management of Google Inc. decided that they want to enter the Chinese market of search engines. The main issue of this move was whether it is necessary to enter the market directly. This means that the company has already established the Chinese-language version of its search engine hosted on the servers outside of China. When the user was accessing google.com from inside of China, the results were automatically delivered in a Chinese translation. At the same time, this method was not suitable enough for the company as the results were constantly censored by the government and the service was unreliable to the extent when it was hard if not impossible to use. The second issue identified was the main competitor, Baidu a Chinese internet provider. The company enjoyed strong government support and was holding the major part of the market. At this point it is vital to mention that the Chinese market was expanding rapidly and Google could not afford missing this opportunity. Chinese government, at the same time posed a requirement that in case Google was to enter the market, they had to comply with the rules of the censorship and provide names of the users that were expressing any dissatisfaction about the government or any related issue. The practice has shown that as soon as such person is identified, he or she will be punished immediately (imprisonment being the least). The following aims were identified for the dissertation in terms of resolving the given problem with Google and posing the results as a concept applicable in similar situations: 1) To identify the issues faced by the company while entering the market in terms of providing high quality service 2) To provide viable recommendations to resolve the issue with the government in a way that would not hurt the image of Google with regard to its ethical policies 3) Develop a strategy that would ideally balance the amount of commitment to the users (as the target market) and the government requirements 4) To determine the effects that Google would experience in case of Google complying with Chinese governments Internet regulations. 2. Methods: Research is a way of thinking critically examining the various aspects of the subject being studied, understanding and formulating guiding principles that govern a particular procedure; and developing and testing new theories (Kumar, 2005). According to Kothari (2008) research is a scientific and systematic search for pertinent information on a specific topic. The purpose of any research is to gain familiarity with a phenomenon or to achieve new insights on the topic, to test a hypothesis of a casual relationship between variables or to find answer to a particular question or set of questions related to particular individual, group or anything. In order to carry out research, it is necessary to design the course of study and how it will be conducted. According to Kumar (2005) research design is a plan, structure and strategy of investigation so conceived as to obtain answers to research questions or problems. The researcher assumes to use descriptive method to answer the research questions which will include surveys or questionnaire and interviews. Mixed method of both quantitative and qualitative research will be used to collect data pertaining to research question about the marketing strategy, the decisions taken by the marketing team and managers, the problems confronted by them while entering the market. The data will be collected through questionnaires which will be administered to the marketing team including marketing head who may be senior manager from the product management department, marketing managers and members from the product marketing team. The total sample size for collecting the data is limited to 25 which include one senior manager from product management department, 4 marketing managers who are responsible to market search engine only and 20 members from marketing team. The limitation for the sample size is mainly due to the fact that Google Inc is large organization and it would not be possible to interview each of the marketing team. As the present study tries to identify the issues of Google search engine, the marketing team responsible for the marketing campaign of search engine is only selected to complete the research with latest information within the stipulated time frame. Aforementioned respondents are selected because it is assumed that combined responses from the board member, and marketing heads will allow extracting answers pertaining to legal issues faced by the company during negotiations with Chinese government, policy implications and what changes were made to the Google’s marketing campaign to market its product in China. The 20 members from the marketing team who are involved in marketing the Google search engine will only be selected as the present study attempts to identify the issues faced by the marketing personnel while entering China and how did they adapt their policies in accordance to the China’s internet regulations. The senior manager will be interviewed so as to know what strategic issues rose while entering the Chinese market and what necessary changes were made to the strategic decisions pertaining to Chinese market. 3. Feasibility: As mentioned above, mixed research methods will be used to collect data from Google Inc., as a case study to identify the problems faced by the companies while entering the foreign markets; through structured questionnaires which will included open ended questions also to identify the problems that arise at the time of entering into the Chinese market, what were the suggestions offered by them at the time of discussions to resolve the issue of censorship and various other facts so that viable solutions are arrived and could be suggested in the present study. As part of the research, structured questionnaires will be administered to the marketing mangers and team members as they are the people behind the strategy of advertising Google Inc, in china. Prior permission will be sought from the HR Manager at Google in China with regard to the study duly explaining them the scope and purpose of the study. A set of questionnaire will be provided to the HR Manager so that any questions which appear to be questioning the confidentiality of the company can be removed and replaced with any such questions relevant to the study as suggested by the HR Manager which will help in providing valuable recommendations. 4. How Your Work Fits Existing Published Work: Levitt (2004) stated that the emergence of the global market concept is one of the most vital and notable changes in the area of marketing in the last decade. It is because of this statement it is possible to make assumptions that can find their application in multiple locations. This work will use this advantage and through the inductive method of the empirical studies will make an attempt to expand a singular case to the point of the strategic implementation. Whenever company has to operate and compete on the international arena, it is necessary that each of its functional parts were well-tuned according to its mission and goal (Bauernberger, 2007). At the same time, it is necessary that the company carries its image and puts all the effort possible to overcoming the conflict. Google had a multi-dimensional task to complete in order to be successful within the boundaries of the given market and maintain its image on the international arena. Pan (2000) considers Chinese market as one of the most rapidly expanding markets that require additional attention in terms of the international companies. The difficulties are posed within the approaches used in business, perception of value by the customer (cultural or even political issue) and certain obstacles in the face of governmental regulations (as in case with Google). Even though it is complicated to gain access to the customer directly (due to strong control, once again), there are certain measures that may be taken in order to successfully overcome the challenges posed. The entrance of Google Inc. has been widely debated within several dimensions, including the decision-making process that the company’s management had to undergo when entering the market (Hill & Jones, 2008). The main concern is the acceptance of the decision by three separate units: customers (including those outside China that determine the image of the company), management and stakeholders. Each of the sides is preferably to be satisfied. Nevertheless, the conflict of interests present in such cases poses additional challenge for the management. According to Chief Marketing Officer of Google, company marketing team was able to reach tremendous results within the Chinese market. Aside several additional successful moves they were able to integrate in the cultural aspects of the customers while maintaining relations with the government on a satisfactory level and keeping their positive company image (Blendstrup, 2007) Yahoo! Inc. faced similar challenge when entering Chinese market (Langville & Meyer, 2006). They took a simple solution and complied with all of the requirements posed by the Chinese government. As a result, they were still not able compete with the Chinese Baidu (internet provider), were not capable of gaining even somewhat sustainable market share and they lost their image as a free, independent, unbiased company that simply would support the freedom of speech. Even though Chinese market is becoming more open, international companies face various challenges while entering the market (Clark, 2010). Even though there is considerably less government control as well as less patriotism for the national product (some connect these two facts), these still remain to be the main barriers for the companies to enter this market. Additional effort is to be made with the purpose of entering the market. US Commerce Secretary Gary Locke as stated at Trade Connections International (2010) admitted that the tensions for the U.S. companies within the Chinese market are still present and some even refer to such conditions as a “trade war”. Mr. Locke mentions Google: “…Google is the reminder that the bad things are not going to happen to the companies”. Thus, the success of the company went as far as setting an example for the other companies dealing with the similar conditions. Koekemoer and Bird (2004) define direct response marketing as a technique that uses at least one of the mass media channels. This approach is found to be applicable in the given case due to the fact that Google, being an internet provider will be able to use its own sources to improve the service. Direct link with the customers will result into better understanding of the service and a degree of emotional attachment to it. Direct-response marketing highly correlates with the amount of sales made in the future (Doyle & Stern, 2006). Being one of the cheapest methods of marketing research, it gives an incredible amount of feedback if constructed properly and adjusted correctly to a certain situation. Google was using the methodology to access their target market in China. 5. Why You Are Doing This Topic: Many international companies nowadays see international expansion as a major driving force in their activities. Struggling for a success, emerging markets are seen as the newest components of the global market by the majority of the companies. Global market itself is a separate case that is worth mentioning. However each company has to face certain challenges when entering the new market and the high is seen for the strategy of entering those markets. Google Inc. has set an example of market entrance in terms of problematic areas. Having to deal with several challenges, they were able to overcome the majority and reach the new level success that might be used in the future. This was the major motivating factor for writing this work. There are various cases that will be mentioned within this work: McDonalds in post-Soviet Union countries, Yahoo in China, Wal-Mart in Germany and several others. These are the situations when such strategy was needed and as it is developed, it will be easier to reply to the challenged posed. Finally, the use of well-known and proven marketing models with the new tools gives a better-than-positive result, increasing the probability of success for the company. Based on the case study used in this work, it will be seen how the corporation can utilize their resources and use marketing in the decision-making process. The combination and diversification of methods brings a similar approach that may be defined as a strategy. 6. Timing Mileposts N.B. You must reach stage 8 at least four weeks before your deadline; a month contingency provision is also advisable to allow for slippages. This is to enable your DA to give you sufficient Feedback on your final draft. You should produce a final Proposal for submission to the SM for approval (as agreed with your DA) in between one and two months from your classroom date. However, please aim for 7 weeks from your start date (class date) at the latest, to ensure time for any necessary revisions and final approval by the 8 week cut-off. Milestone Description Due date Remarks 1 Stage 1: Area of interest identified 1st September Done 2 Stage 2: Specific topic selected 9th September Done 3 Stage 3: Topic refined to develop dissertation proposal 26th September Done 4 Stage 4: Proposal written and submitted 15th October In progress 5 Stage 5: Collection of data and information 7th November 6 Stage 6: Analysis and interpretation of collected data/information 30th November 7 Stage 7: Writing up 7th December 8 Stage 8: Final draft prepared – submission of dissertation 15th January 9 Final Deadline – nine months from classroom date. 15th February Read More