International Marketing Research example essay topic

1. INTRODUCTION There is no doubt that England acts an important role in the world!'s market system, especially in Europe. But it seems that English products have little effects on Chinese market. To research the influence of English companies and products in China, I make a hypothesis that is! ^0 there is just a few Chinese consumers realize that English companies and products are famous in China.! +/- Because it is hardly to find some marketing books and researches, which talk about china, so I designed four questions by myself to ask some Chinese people.

The questions and the answers are listed below. I consider that these kinds of information are very useful to help me to verify my hypothesis. 1. Q: Which foreign country!'s products are the most popular used in China? A: c'UAmerica (42%) c'UJapan (33%) c^U German (1%) 2.

Q: Which foreign company!'s products are most used in your common life? A: c'USONY (38%) c'UMicrosoft (20%) c^U Coca-Cola (8%) 3. Q: In your opinion, which trademark is most famous in China? A: c'U Coca-Cola (28%) c'UNIKE (23%) c^USONY (9%) 4.

Q: Which English company do you know or its products you have used before? A: c'U None (55%) c'UWrong answer (17%) c^U JAGUAR (2%) According to this survey, I verified my hypothesis. Although China has the largest number of consumers and the biggest potential market in the world; meanwhile, England is one of the richest country in the world and acts very important role in the global marketing system, England has not open the door of the Chinese market yet. Nowadays, globalization has been the main trend of the world. In addition, international marketing research has been paid more attention than before too.

Consequently, I will argue the problem above by international marketing theory in this assignment. 2. MARKETING RESEARCH IN A GLOBAL ENVIRONMENT It is well known that marketing is an indispensably factor of the management system in each company. As an academic assignment, the accurate meaning of marketing should be defined firstly.

The best way to define it may be: ! ^0 marketing is a business philosophy that regards customer satisfaction as the key to successful trading and advocates the use of management practices that help identify and respond to customer needs! +/- (Hill & Sullivan 1996 P 3). In addition, as international transport and communications become ever more feasible, the directors frequently look beyond their domestic markets for business opportunities. Consequently, international marketing research has become a very important part in some huge global companies such as Ford and IBM. A large number of factors are different between international marketing and domestic marketing.

Figure 1 summaries some of the main points of divergence (Hill & Sullivan 1996 P 347): Domestic marketing International marketing Main language Many languages Dominant culture Multi-culture Research relatively straightforward Research complex Relatively stable environment Frequently unstable environment Single currency Exchange rate problems Business conventions understood Conventions diverse and unclear Figure 1 Domestic versus international marketing 3. THE GENERAL EXISTING WEAKNESS IN ENGLISH COMPANIES As one of the richest country in the world, England has many experiences and a perfect system in its economy. They keep ahead in some areas, such as accounting system and human resource management. But, to compare with other counties! companies, there are some general weaknesses existing in the English companies.

Firstly, arrogance is a popular shortcoming of English people. They always consider that United Kingdom is the most advanced country in the world; they are the greatest regions of all regions on the earth. They realize that all of people in the world have the similar views with them. For the same reason, English companies do not like to research and understand the mentality of people who live in other areas.

They only think selling the products to consumers, not to research what kinds of goods that are customers needed. In addition, English companies spend little money and spirit on advertising of their products in foreign country in which they want to sell. For example, when I was in China, I seldom saw any advertisements in TV, which introduce the advantages of English merchandise. Consequently, the impression of English products in Chinese people!'s brain is very shallow. In their mind, American or Japanese companies are the best in the world; their products are the greatest of all. Thirdly, in the side of update of merchandise, English corporations are seemed lacking of enthusiasm.

Conservative mind is one of their foibles. For instance, American or Japanese manufactures always produce advanced products to instead of old type of goods and to attract Chinese! ^0 audiences! +/-! attention, such as Nike and Sony. We can find a lot of kinds of new Nike or Sony!'s products on shelf in emporium. It is obviously that English establishment drop behind others in this way. 4.

THE CHARACTERS OF CHINESE MARKET AND CHINESE CONSUMERS Chinese market has attracted foreign investors because of its market potential. It has the most population and the largest market in the world. This is the biggest advantage that no other countries could exceed. For these reasons, in recent years, more and more foreign investors have tried their best to introduce new ventures into this market, which full of chances and challenges. On the other hand, there are some entry barriers and dangers existed in the market. Chinese market has its own characters that are very different from other countries! , such as new legal and financial systems, greater distances, new modes of transportation, currency exchange rates.

The foreign companies have to acclimatize themselves to the strange situation. In addition, social and culture factors could not be neglected. These two factors influence all aspects of consumer and buyer behavior. As Doole and Lowe said, In the process of buying, consumer!'s behavior such as consumer!'s feeling attitude and understanding can be influenced by the multifarious of elements; this is very important (Doole & Lowe P 73). In China, the needs of consumers are so strange from other countries! consumers who they have contacted with before for the foreign companies. They hanker for fashionable goods.

So, we can see that the styles of mobile phones are often up to the minute. Otherwise, they do not like to accept the new things. Sometimes, Chinese consumers are very loyal to one brand of merchandise. They only buy and use one company!'s product immovably.

Never think to change though there are a lot of new and other brand of goods exist. Another important thing is that price is a main factor of products to them. Although this is a common character of all countries! customers, Chinese may spend time to compare the rates of different companies! products to find a real bargain. They have enough patience and glad to wait half a year for the depreciating of some goods. 5. THE WAY OF BRITISH PRODUCTS TO OPEN THE DOOR OF CHINESE MARKET To all companies in England, because that China has the largest area and the biggest population, Chinese market has huge potential.

There is no one can reject this kind of temptation. 6. THE SUCESSFUL CASE OF FOREIGN COMPANIES IN CHINA 7. CONCLUSION.