International Marketing

International marketing is the performance of business activities designed to plan, price, promote, and
direct the flow of a company’s goods and services to consumers or users in more than one nation for a

profit.

International marketer’s task is more complicated than that of the domestic marketer because the
international marketer must deal with at least two levels of uncontrollable uncertainly instead of one.
Operation Internationally organization faces the major threats in form of not only by the consumers but
on the controversy side the government policies and litigation place vital as in case with the middle
eastern country for the pharmaceutical organization must cater them polices with true latter and spirit.

Environmental Adaptation Needed

To adjust and adapt a marketing program to foreign markets, marketers must be able to interpret
effectively the influence and impact of each of the uncontrollable environmental elements on the
marketing plan for each foreign market in which they hope to do business.
The task of cultural adjustment, however, is the most challenging and important one confronting
international marketers; they must adjust their marketing efforts to cultures to which they are not
attuned. In dealing with unfamiliar markets, marketers must be aware of the frames of reference, they
are using in making their decisions or evaluating the potential of a market, because judgments are
derived from experience that is the result of acculturation in the home country. Once a frame of
reference is established, it becomes an important factor in determining or modifying a marketer’s
reaction to situations—social and even nonsocial.
Your self-reference criterion can prevent you from being aware of cultural differences or from
recognizing the importance of those differences. Thus, you might fail to recognize the need to act, you
might discount the cultural differences that exist among countries, or you might react to a situation in a
way offensive to your hosts.
Ethnocentrism and the SRC can influence an evaluation of the appropriateness of a domestically
designed marketing mix for a foreign market. Example is the “Pet” in Pet Milk. The name has been
used for decades, yet in France, the word pet means, among other things, “flatulence”— again, not
the desired image for canned milk.

Stages of International Marketing Involvement

Once a company has decided to go international, it must decide the degree of marketing involvement
and commitment it is prepared to make. These decisions should reflect considerable study and analysis
of market potential and company capabilities—a process not always followed. Research has revealed
several factors favoring faster internationalization:
1. Companies with either high-technology and/or marketing-based resources appear to be better
equipped to internationalize than more traditional manufacturing kinds of companies;
2. smaller home markets and larger production capacities appear to favor internationalization.
3. firms with key managers well networked internationally can accelerate the internationalization
process.

Balance of Payments
When countries trade, financial transactions among businesses or consumers of different nations occur.
Products and services are exported and imported, monetary gifts are exchanged, investments are made,
cash payments are made, and cash receipts received, and vacation and foreign travel occur. In short,
over a period, there is a constant flow of money into and out of a country. The system of accounts that
records a nation’s international financial transactions is called its balance of payments.
A balance-of-payments statement includes three accounts:
 the current account, a record of all merchandise exports, imports, and services plus unilateral
transfers of funds.
 the capital account, a record of direct investment, portfolio investment, and short-term capital
movements to and from countries.
 the official reserves account, a record of exports and imports of gold, increases or decreases in
foreign exchange, and increases or decreases in liabilities to foreign central banks.

Protectionism
Nations utilize legal barriers, exchange barriers, and psychological barriers to restrain the entry of
unwanted goods.
Countless reasons to maintain government restrictions on trade are espoused by protectionists,
but essentially all arguments can be classified as follows:
1. protection of an infant industry
2. protection of the home market
3. need to keep money at home
 4. encouragement of capital accumulation
5. maintenance of the standard of living and real wages
6. conservation of natural resources
7. industrialization of a low-wage nation
8. maintenance of employment and reduction of unemployment
9. national defense
10. increase of business size
11. retaliation and bargaining.
To encourage development of domestic industry and protect existing industry, governments may
establish such barriers to trade as tariffs and a variety of nontariff barriers including, quotas, boycotts,
monetary barriers, and market barriers. Barriers are imposed against imports and against foreign
businesses.

Required Adaptation
Adaptation is a key concept in international marketing, and willingness to adapt is a crucial attitude.
Adaptation, or at least accommodation, is required on small matters as well as large ones. In fact, small,
seemingly insignificant situations are often the most crucial. More than tolerance of an alien culture is
required. Affirmative acceptance, that is, open tolerance may be needed as well. Through such
affirmative acceptance, adaptation becomes easier because empathy for another’s point of view
naturally leads to ideas for meeting cultural differences.
1. open tolerance
2. flexibility
3. humility
4. justice/fairness
5. ability to adjust to varying tempos
6. curiosity/interest
7. knowledge of the country
8. liking for others
9. ability to command respect
10. ability to integrate oneself into the environment

Imperatives, Electives, and Exclusives

Business customs can be grouped into imperatives, customs that must be recognized and
accommodated; electives, customs to which adaptation is helpful but not necessary; and exclusives,
customs in which an outsider must not participate. An international marketer must appreciate the
nuances of cultural imperatives, cultural electives, and cultural exclusives.
Elements of Culture
Previously culture was defined by listing its five elements: values, rituals, symbols, beliefs, and thought
processes. International marketers must design products, distribution systems, and promotional
programs with due consideration of each of the five.
Cultural Values
Underlying the cultural diversity that exists among countries are fundamental differences in cultural
values, that is, the importance of things and ideas. The most useful information on how cultural values
influence various types of business and market behavior.
Rituals
Life is filled with rituals, that is, patterns of behavior and interaction that are learned and repeated. The
most obvious ones are associated with major events in life. Marriage ceremonies and funerals are good
examples. Life is also filled with little rituals, such as dinner at a restaurant or a visit to a department
store or even grooming before heading off to work or class in the morning.
Symbols
this learning begins immediately after birth, as we begin to hear the language spoken and see the facial
expressions and feel the touch and taste the milk of our mothers. We begin our discussion of symbolic
systems with language, the most obvious part and the part that most often involves conscious
communication.
 Language.

 Aesthetics as Symbols.