In: Operations Management
t is a responsibility of the global firm to ascertain the level of importance of various aspects of culture. Companies’ operations need to recognize and adjust to the cultural environment. In this week’s Lesson, you will find eight elements of culture. For this assignment, there are four elements of culture that are most important when marketing products and services internationally: language, religion, manners and customs, and aesthetics. Indicate why each is important and provide examples in your response.
Marketing a product in a language which the locals can understand easily is very important. People connect well with a product, when it is marketed in their mother tongue. So, instead of just using software to translate text to local language, it is better to hire local professionals before creating the advertisements so that language errors can be avoided. For example, the meaning of an advertisement was misunderstood in many cases when companies created campaigns carelessly without hiring a local expert and just using software to translate the text..
Many religions are followed worldwide. So, for a global product, care must be taken not to harm the religious sentiments of the people of a country. For example, if the product is being marketed in a Muslim country, care must be taken not to disregard Muslim religion traditions in any way. If a food brand is being marketed in a Muslim country, the by products must not be in any way related to pork.
It is very important to see that the advertisement of a product represents the manners and customs of a country. For example, even in two English speaking countries, there will be a lot of variation in manners and customs. For example Scotland has many traditions and customs which are quite different from USA and if a marketing campaign does not consider these differences and worse if it mis-represents the local customs in any way, the entire marketing efforts willl be negatively impacted.
Tastes of people differ worldwide. What is considered cool and awesome in one country might not be considered the same in another country. For example a particular colour or body type might be popular in an Eastern country and the entire opposite may be popular in a Western country. The marketing efforts will go in vain if aesthetics are not considered. So efforts must be taken to see that local aesthetics are given due importance before marketing a product.