Every country and culture, whether it’s as ancient as India or as young as the Czech Republic, has a history that will greatly affect both the market and the marketer. A market that has been heavily exploited in the past by foreigners will turn a predictably skeptical eye toward any overseas company seeking new sales territory. It may even refuse products that could greatly benefit the society. Understanding that history will enable a marketer to approach the culture in a more subtle manner, and it will certainly cause an adjustment of schedule. On the other end, a culture that has been marked by independence for some time will have few fears of foreign operations and may find the subtle approach far too lackluster and slow.
Marketers may bring their own business to the process and should take care to separate themselves, at least emotionally, from their personal and cultural history. Oftentimes, this includes racial prejudices that are difficult to shake, earlier political disagreements that have never been fully settled, of old unhealed war wounds.
Let’s look at the race issue first. Companies with Caucasian marketing personnel returning to post-apartheid South Africa are generally plagued with a feeling that they owe something to the new black majority government. It’s a completely self-generated debt as the government is, in reality, overjoyed that investment has returned after the long embargo. However, this joy doesn’t prevent South Africa companies from taking advantage of counterparts’ guilt feelings when it’s time to cut a deal.
On the political front, the relationship, between Vietnam and the United States is a prime example of two sets of marketers misinterpreting each other’s history and culture when it came time to do business. Following in the wake of the bloody two-decade war that ended in 1975, the United States and Vietnam finally reopened trade in 1994. The Vietnamese assumed that American business community would heap investment on them to make up for past wrong, while the American thought they would be welcomed as the saviors of Vietnam’s floundering economy. Most of America’s marketers sent to Vietnam were small children during the war, and the conflict had little bearing on their lives. Vietnam’s decision makers on the other hand were primarily veterans of the conflict and saw it as the key element of the relationship. Neither side paid attention to the other’s view of history nor the results have been decidedly disappointing for almost everyone.
1. The passage mainly discusses that ____.
2. It is advisable for a marketer to ____.
3. According to the passage, which of the following is true?
4. The Caucasian example indicates that ____.
5. According to the passage, which of the following is NOT true?