It happened recently when I went to my uncle’s house in Chennai that his one year old daughter stopped crying when she listened to Jennifer Lopez and started dancing itself within the small arena built for it, the cradle. If I have to approve the definition for globalization in wikepedia I would say this is the perfect one. Yes, friends the impact of globalization is felt in each and every corner of this world but as a management student and more precisely a marketing student I was giving a thought is there this globalization has something to change with our traditional marketing views and concepts. I felt yes and it forced me to fill my pen once again.
If I have to see globalization I would see it as “Dealing with Differences”.oh! That’s a great task for every marketer you know. Anything in this world is termed difficult when it has uncontrollable in it. These uncontrollable play a very important role and this makes a marketer to see globalization as a threat. The uncontrollable comes in various forms lifestlyle, culture, demography, geography etc.
Uncontrollable Are Always Uncontrollables.Say Its Bhagvat Gita or Mintzberg Emergent Strategy or Al Ries “You Can’t Go There From Here” In Positioning. But a marketer can understand this uncontrollable better. Now the question comes can understanding this uncontrollable will help a marketer to convert threat into an opportunity. The answer could be yes with at least high probability because there are many companies like McDonalds, Foremost Dairy (Thailand) which has understood this uncontrollable and converted this threat into opportunity.
At this time I also felt there is necessity to rethink our conventional definitions of marketing. Marketing according to KOTLER is meeting customer needs profitably and satisfactorily. When it comes to globalization it’s a task for marketer to define who is my customer? What is value and satisfaction for my customer here is not going to be satisfaction for customer outside the world.
The conventional definition for demand says its willingness to buy and ability to pay. But when it comes to globalization a prospect may have willingness to buy ,ability to pay but his social cultural factors may restrict him to buy that product. So the conventional definition brings in one more variable called “limitation on consumer because of socio-cultural effects”.
Lets have a touch on branding .Say a brand positions itself differently in two countries today. Say a motor bike claiming “speed’ as its competency in one country and “style” in the other. As days go due to globalization and democratization of knowledge consumer in one country will come to know my brand claims two things and what does my brand stands for? It may lead to dilution of brand equity in due course.
Let’s think about Michael porter’s conventional strategies, cost leadership, differentiation focus. When world becomes boundary less it leads to non-price competition. Will cost-leadership strategy hold good is a big question mark. Think about focus strategy .if you are concentrating in niche market fine .but when all your competitors move towards other countries and expand their product portfolio if you are idle you will be making satisfactory profits but you will be pushed far behind in market share and you will not grow.
So its time to rethink and redefine not only your major marketing principles but fundamentals of marketing principles.
Compilation of speech made by
If I have to see globalization I would see it as “Dealing with Differences”.oh! That’s a great task for every marketer you know. Anything in this world is termed difficult when it has uncontrollable in it. These uncontrollable play a very important role and this makes a marketer to see globalization as a threat. The uncontrollable comes in various forms lifestlyle, culture, demography, geography etc.
Uncontrollable Are Always Uncontrollables.Say Its Bhagvat Gita or Mintzberg Emergent Strategy or Al Ries “You Can’t Go There From Here” In Positioning. But a marketer can understand this uncontrollable better. Now the question comes can understanding this uncontrollable will help a marketer to convert threat into an opportunity. The answer could be yes with at least high probability because there are many companies like McDonalds, Foremost Dairy (Thailand) which has understood this uncontrollable and converted this threat into opportunity.
At this time I also felt there is necessity to rethink our conventional definitions of marketing. Marketing according to KOTLER is meeting customer needs profitably and satisfactorily. When it comes to globalization it’s a task for marketer to define who is my customer? What is value and satisfaction for my customer here is not going to be satisfaction for customer outside the world.
The conventional definition for demand says its willingness to buy and ability to pay. But when it comes to globalization a prospect may have willingness to buy ,ability to pay but his social cultural factors may restrict him to buy that product. So the conventional definition brings in one more variable called “limitation on consumer because of socio-cultural effects”.
Lets have a touch on branding .Say a brand positions itself differently in two countries today. Say a motor bike claiming “speed’ as its competency in one country and “style” in the other. As days go due to globalization and democratization of knowledge consumer in one country will come to know my brand claims two things and what does my brand stands for? It may lead to dilution of brand equity in due course.
Let’s think about Michael porter’s conventional strategies, cost leadership, differentiation focus. When world becomes boundary less it leads to non-price competition. Will cost-leadership strategy hold good is a big question mark. Think about focus strategy .if you are concentrating in niche market fine .but when all your competitors move towards other countries and expand their product portfolio if you are idle you will be making satisfactory profits but you will be pushed far behind in market share and you will not grow.
So its time to rethink and redefine not only your major marketing principles but fundamentals of marketing principles.
Compilation of speech made by
Prabhu.S at KIAMS International Marketing class.
Comments
this is indeed a very intresting take on globalisation and ita effects on basic marketing principles.
I completely agree that today globalisation has grown much more than a concept in books and is changing every individuals life.
This concept of globalisation has indeed led to the development of borderless world but the question which we must ask ourself is "is this a equal opportinity borderless world or is this the same old story of one ruling and exploiting the other party? "
as far as your comment on poters generic strategies is concerned , i belive that with globalisation the competition in market is going to increase which will eventually lead to better products at a lower cost, due to usage of new and better technology and managemewnt practices leading to increased productivity and economies of scales. so this will lead to a natural succesion where cost would be an important parameter which would be considered by buyer, as using of same technology globally will turn the product to mere commodity where diffrentiation would be difficult by consumers.
then the only way left would be to turn to diffrentiation strategy where the products would be diffrentiated based on non tangible characterstics like ego satisfiers, and when diffrentiation is based on such non tangible characterstics this will only lead to satisfying need of a particular group of individuals with a specific need and want which can be satisfied by a specific product mix or in other words we can say that focus strategies will come to play.
in the end i would like to say that what we can expect in future is mass customisation where customised products would be available at the cost of mass production so that only an marginal increase is seen as compared to lower cost of economies of scale.
so future for the consumers is bright and marketers would have to work relly hard to make their business profitable entity.
REGARDS
MEHUL SHARMA