Chapter 2 -‐ Literature review
2.3. Brand localization and culture
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2) Marketing Innovations are the activities aimed at increasing sales volumes or market share, but not the activities aimed at decreasing unit costs or increasing product quality, which is the main feature of process innovations;
3) Clarifications might be required for innovations that are both organizational and marketing. In this case innovations should involve new marketing methods (not just sales activities).
2.2. Product-‐centric vs. customer-‐centric marketing
Galbraith (2002) provides a clear distinction between the goals of a product-centric and a customer-centric focus: a “product-centric company tries to find as many uses and customers as possible for its products”, whereas “a customer-centric company tries to find as many products as possible for its customer" through focusing on the product integration. Table 2 shows that the customer-centric approach puts the customer's needs and the relationship with the customer at every core aspect of the business, whereas the more traditional product- centric approach focuses on the transactional sale of products.
Fader (2012) underlined the importance of customer experience in customer-centric marketing. Unlike product centric marketing approach, which is focused on the products that the company brings to market rather than the customers who buy those products, customer centric marketing have robust mechanisms designed to augment customer experiences. Such firms value and consider customer satisfaction in everything they do.
They talk about experiences, and benefits, and often feature imagery of people on their marketing pieces. They design pricing models to fit customers’ lives and often integrate them with partners and offer platform deals.
2.3. Brand localization and culture
Speaking about the approaches, which brands should develop to meet consumer expectations when they intend to penetrate into a foreign market, Baker and Sterenberg (2003) state that the nature of the local culture in which the brand must operate is one of the main factors that should be taken into primary consideration.
Countries included in their study were plotted on two axes depending on whether their
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orientation toward brands is individualistic or collectivist and on whether they are oriented more toward their own culture and values (local focus) or more receptive to global influences (global focus).
As Baker and Sterenberg (2003) point out, Cultural Individualists are the countries (in their research Russia belongs to this group), which have a high pride in their culture combined with strong individualistic values. This requires both localization and an individual connection with local consumers, with the individual connection probably more important than the cultural one.
Global Individualists have a weaker interest or pride in their own culture and a correspondingly greater openness to the world. While there is thus a low need for localization, consumers in these cultures still have a high need to connect with brands at an individual level. They may thereby feel part of a wider global “tribe”.
Global Sensitives are collectivist societies that are open to the world. Connectivity through and availability of global brands is often more important than pride in local culture. There is thus a medium need for localization in these cultures, more a matter of translation than adaptation. A product or brand's origin and where it is manufactured are important.
Cultural Sensitives are the collectivist markets consumers take high pride in local culture. They expect global brands to understand and respect their culture and, when possible, adapt to local situations both in terms of communication and product features (Baker & Sterenberg, 2003).
2.3.1. The definition of culture
The term “culture” is very broad. It has different meanings in the fields of communication, psychology, sociology, anthropology, and information studies. In this research we use the notion “national culture”, which definition is borrowed from anthropology. According to Hofstede, (1980) national culture is equivalent to the collective mental programming of a group, tribe, minority, or a nation. It is the aggregate of individual personality traits. He defines national culture as “the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group or category of people from another” (Hofstede, 1991). He suggests that people share a collective
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national character that represents their cultural mental programming. This mental programming shapes values, beliefs, assumptions, expectations, perceptions and behavior.
2.3.2. The role of culture in localization process
As claimed and proven by Hoft (1995), Marcus and Gould (2000) and Faiola (2002), culture plays a central role in the localization process. They have described numerous cases of market failures where companies did not thoroughly consider local culture issues.
Culture is highlighted in the definitions of localization in industry and academia.
According to the Localization Industry Standards Association (LISA), an international association founded in 1990, localization is “the process of modifying products or services to account for differences in distinct markets” which covers three main categories: linguistic issues, content and cultural issues, and technical issues.
Academia researchers make even bigger emphasis on culture when discussing the concept of localization. Gribbons (1997) defines localization in a similar way as LISA does, but he gives prominent status to culture by putting cultural issues above technical issues. In his two-level localization process, localization includes adjusting the features of the product (e.g., translation, punctuation, dates, etc.) to mirror the needs and conventions of the target audience on the surface level and adjusting the aesthetic appeal, images, colors, logic, functionality, and communication patterns on the cultural level.
To illustrate the importance of culture and its complexity in localization practices, Hoft (1995) presented an Iceberg analogy. The researcher suggests that issues of translation, punctuation, and aesthetic appeal are just the tip of the iceberg (the visible section above the water that is only 10 percent of the whole). But the iceberg’s huge body is invisible.
Ninety percent of the iceberg consists of unspoken and unconscious rules, i.e. common knowledge, values, traditions and cultural archetypes shared within a culture.
2.3.3. The specifics of national Russian culture and character
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Being holistic and influential, Russian culture (Slavic-Orthodox culture) is treated as one of few global cultures (Huntington 1993).
Russian culture can neither be defined as western or eastern one. Through the centuries Russia absorbed the basic values of both the West and the East - reason and inspiration.
And it served as a bridge between Western and Eastern cultural traditions, with the certain psychological dependence on both (Trubetzkoy, 1991). Due to different tendencies of world history coming from the east and the west and which coincided in the Russian people, Russia became a nation of inherent opposites and contrasts. These contradictions of Russian character were often discussed by historians.
According to one of the best Russian historians of the nineteenth century V. Kluchevski, the national character combined among the others such qualities as: the habit of patient struggle against misfortunes and hardships; ability to concentrate efforts; ability to cooperate within large geographic space (Kluchevski, 1904). The other famous intellectual, P. Chaadaev defined contradictive Russian national character by such features as: brutality and inclination to violence; impersonal collectivism; Messianism;
internal freedom; kindness; humanism; gentleness; search for truth (Chaadaev, 1991).
People in Russia take great pride in their cultural uniqueness and expect the rest of the world to admire their cultural heritage.
2.3.4. Language localization
According to GALA (2013) definition, language localization “describes the process of adapting a product to a specific international language or culture so that it seems natural to that particular region” so that to make a product or service appear as if it had been developed specifically in and for the local market and allow a company to communicate effectively with international consumers and users (GALA, 2013).
Ibeh, Luo and Dinnie (2005) found that by offering consumers an experience in their preferred language that is both sensitive and relevant to the local culture, localization affords to:
- Build a community of users (or potential users) within a region or who share language and culture;
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- Expand accessibility and connectivity for global consumers;
- Customize the brand for the target market;
- Offer a better consumer experience and more convenience.
2.3.5. Color localization
2.3.5.1. Color effects in marketing
Schmitt and Pan (1994) consider color to be a vital part of products, services, packages, logos, displays and collateral.
According to Madden, Hewitt and Roth (2000), color design is a potent cue for product, brand differentiation and for creating a sustaining corporate identities as well as consumer perceptions.
Aslam (2006) describes color as an integral element of corporate and marketing communications. It induces moods and emotions, influences consumers’ perceptions and behavior and helps companies to position in the market and differentiate from the competitors.
Color and the product
Kotler (1973) argues that the tangible product is only a small part of the total consumption package and that buyers respond to the total product including pleasantries, imagery and collateral. Cheskin & Masten Inc. (1987) state that, while product quality is the ultimate determinant of consumer satisfaction, imagery is the vehicle that generates interest via “sensation transference” (Cheskin & Masten Inc., 1987) among the target population, thereby implying that the emotional response so triggered by colors in products, packages and logos influences consumer perceptions of the product and the company.
Color and the advertising messages
Color is instrumental in attracting consumer attention to media advertisements.
Researches of Hornik (1980), Berg-Weitzel and Laar (2001) showed that adapting
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advertisement execution to the local preferences, culture and marketing mix for each foreign market is effective.
Lee and Barnes (1989) found that the product and color of print advertisements and the product and type of magazine were correlated and there were differences in the use of color in racially oriented magazine advertising but not so between gender-sensitive magazines.
2.3.5.2. The necessity for color localization
Aslam (2006) believes that different cultures differ in their aesthetic expressions as colors represent different meanings and aesthetic appeals in different cultures. The meanings given to some colors may be pan-cultural, while some are regional and some are unique to specific cultures and it is imperative to explore the meanings and effects of a chosen color in the target market before the launch of a product or promotion campaign. Figure 2 is the model of color application in marketing, developed by the researcher.