"Why Is It Important For Marketing Strategists To Think In Terms Of Cultural Issues And Cultural Factors When Formulating A Marketing Strategy?"

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorUniversity, Bachelor's October 2001

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"Why is it important for marketing strategists to think in terms of cultural issues and cultural factors when formulating a marketing strategy?" Introduction Marketing strategy, as summarised by Drummond & Ensor (1999) '...involves achieving a superior competitive position within a defined market...it involves segmentation, targeting and positioning.' However, those three aspects of the strategy to achieve a superior competitive position would, possibly, require the consideration of cultural differences within and between the target markets.

Advertising, in essence, rarely appeals to the reasoning, thinking, rational part of us all. If it did then it might not fulfil its objectives in the given amount of time - say thirty seconds of a television commercial or the glimpse of a billboard. Armed with this knowledge, that he must appeal to the emotional, feeling side of his customers, a mythical marketing strategist may consider that a different approach in each target market may be required due to cultural conditions - that is, those aspects of emotion and feeling that may influenced by something ascribed to 'culture'.

But what exactly are these cultural conditions? And what is meant by 'cultural factors'? Fundamentally, our initial enquiry must be 'what do we mean by "culture" '? Any discussion on the relative merits of having the marketing strategist think in terms of 'cultural issues and cultural factors' must begin from this point.

Although it may seem self-evident to most that such a discussion must take place, it is important that it should not be based on the pre-conception that the consideration given to the 'cultural issues and cultural factors' is, ipso facto, important. Furthermore, as business is, essentially, a rational activity, one must consider the degree of mysticism affecting the decisions made within the rational framework.

So, an important point begins to take shape - that...