Where in the world is this man?
He wakes to the sound of Madonna singing the theme to the new James Bond film that opens at the local cinema next week.
He shaves with a Gillette razor. Washes with Body Shop tea tree oil shower gel. Shampoos with Pantene. Moisturises with Nivea for Men. Splashes on CK One. Deodorises with Sure. Gels his hair with L’Oreal.
He hears a big story about an incident just happening in downtown New York on the radio, and so switches on CNN on cable TV while he eats his Kellogg cornflakes.
After catching the bus to work, he gets off at the stop closest to Starbucks to get a coffee and drinks it in the store while checking his GMail email on his wireless-enabled iPhone.
He then goes to the office, logs onto the network and opens his Windows Outlook and reads the overnight email update from ‘American Idol.
This man could be in 20 or more countries. Probably the most limiting factor is that ‘American Idol" is not run everywhere, but usually there is a local version instead or as well.
In my experience, it is usually not the consumer that is the limiting factor in creating global brands – but the mindset and limitations of manufacturers.
So this short article is designed to help flag some of the considerations and thought processes to factor in if you’re thinking about rolling out what you currently market as a global brand.
Consideration 1: The local global village
Consumers live in a global world, but consume in their local village
It is increasingly difficult to tell where in the world you are by doing an inventory of the brands in a consumer’s bathroom shelf - or even by the shops they buy in, as Carrefour, Wal-Mart and others pop up all over.
Consumers of particular brands tend to be similar – for example BMW 3-series buyers are quite alike, wherever they are. And while media may be very local, and locally owned, the programming certainly is not. Comedy series like ‘Friends’, game shows like ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire’ and reality TV series like ‘American Idol/ X-Factor" are attracting the same types of audiences everywhere.
Global brands can provide useful shorthand for the consumer and can be positioned and leveraged everywhere. However, your consumer expects to consume them locally.
They do not care about the supply chain and manufacturing benefits of multi-lingual packages; that it is more efficient to produce just 3 pack sizes or that it is more effective to make an ad with no ‘direct to camera’ lip-synch so it can be run in 27 countries. If your product is best explained face to face on film then that’s how it should be done.
Be a good global citizen in every village.
We don’t live in isolated villages anymore. The world is smaller thanks to travel and more importantly the media. The need to fill all 24 hours of news channels means more and more news is needed.
McDonalds, Nike, Nestle. What do they stand for in the global village? Deforestation? Child labour? Bad mother care practices?
Coke contamination in Belgium. Persil Power in the UK. P&G Secrets white mark staining. Perrier water contamination. These all became global events* even though they were to all intents a local village incident.
Consideration 2: Think like Madonna
One thing that used to strike me when doing my global marketing roles over the years, was that no matter what taxi I got into in whatever country, Madonna was always playing on the radio at some point.
It was from that experience that I concluded that (a) we should be able to succeed wherever she had and (b) to succeed we had to think and act like her. Some ways of doing this include:
Follow the experts.
To succeed globally, just watch and follow the experts. Where do they go? Where do they go first? Where do they launch new lines first and why?
This leads you to consumers who they have found to be the most receptive, or the environment most conducive to success.
Follow your customers
Are the big trade channels building and surviving there? Look at the Carrefour and Wal-Mart chains in particular.
It is likely that these big names will be attracting the type of consumers that would buy your brands and products. If the customers you are already dealing with are there, follow them. You have a head start if they know you!
Follow the execution
What brand approach is working best in which environment? An approach that uses a fixed product and the same copy everywhere, like Gillette, Colgate, Dove and Pampers?
Or a regional approach with regional brands and portfolios and local executions and variants, as we see with L’Oreal and Johnson & Johnson?
Consideration 3: Approaching the village
Look at the forest not the trees
The danger is to rush in with your execution and try to see if it matches the consumer. Don’t. Take some big steps backwards and take a look at the bigger picture first. Look at the whole forest not the individual trees in it. What does that mean?
Some pointers follow:
People are people
Focus on the similarities first, not the differences. Too often marketers start with the ‘…but my consumer is different’ approach. Suspend that, and start by focusing on the similarities based on the fact that “people are people” and have fundamentally the same basic desires and drives. Understand these first.
Habits:
Mothers everywhere want the best for their babies. In a study I was involved in we found that every mother everywhere has the same set of baby care regimes that she goes through during the day. In fact they were carried out at almost the same time by mothers in every country - driven by the fact that a human baby has a set biological habit and developmental process.
Aspirations:
Women (and men) aspire to stay looking young. ‘Because I’m worth it’ – true everywhere?
Needs:
People everywhere need strong healthy teeth. This is just one of a clear, common set of needs that everyone has.
Local differences in consumers are more likely to drive the final execution or variant of the brand than the core offer. For example, in Latin America consumers aspire to lighter hair while in China they want darker hair.
Insights and concepts transplant: so listen - don’t just hear
Insights and the concepts inspired by them, because of the above issues, usually transplant. Test the core insight and core concept before the specific execution of your brand or product.
For example: the ability to put clothes on after applying a body moisturizer, kids like to have fun in the bath but the bathroom is cramped, online grocery shopping is great – but waiting at home for 2 hours for delivery is a waste of time. These are all truths – the execution may differ by country.
Listen carefully when testing, don’t just hear what they are saying. Read between the lines.
For example, nappy rash is a major problem for all babies. But in China, research with mothers reported that there was no nappy rash issue or market for products, based on what mothers were saying.
We ran a second round of groups, this time asking the mothers if they noticed anything when changing nappies. “Yes redness, very occasionally”, they said. On prompting we found this “redness” was a major problem and mothers felt very guilty about it – and they got free products from the hospital for it.
This confirmed there was indeed opportunity for nappy rash prevention products like wipes, disposable nappies and creams.
Someone else may have got there first
By understanding the insights and ideas, you may find that someone else has already got there. If you are, then acquisition is likely to be the best route.
Unilever are masters at this. They look at acquiring local brands that fit their current portfolio and roll their technology, line extensions and communication behind them.
Johnson & Johnson have done it with their baby business. In looking to emulate the success of Johnson’s Baby brand, they found that the idea and core success factors were owned effectively by Penaten in Germany and Natusan in Scandinavia – so they acquired them instead of wasting time with a me-too proposition.
No second-class citizens
A major problem when expanding globally is the tendency for marketers to be ‘ethnocentric’ - assuming that consumers outside of the big 10 developed countries are second-class. So often one hears about the need for ‘cheaper products’.
However, why should any consumer be given second-rate solutions? Are there not more innovative ways of delivering the solution, from pack size to general purpose formulations?
In Romania, for example, 25% of total household income of those with a young baby was spent on disposable nappies. This was because they offered a major benefit in small-sized flats, which were often shared with the young parents’ family. There’s clearly is a market for highly effective disposable nappies there. But was there a more cost effective way of delivering the technology and the solution?
Summary
To create a successful global brand you need to operate in a locally delivered global village. You succeed by thinking and acting like Madonna! Focus on the similarities among consumers first, then understand what your core insight and concept is. Test that. If someone already owns it – buy them. If they don’t, work out the local way of executing your global idea.
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