Cross-Cultural Consumer Behavior



Table of Contents

Case one1

Lessons Learned1

Cultural Differences and Marketing Strategy2

Question#13

Question#23

Case two5

Lessons Learned5

Issues Affecting Consumer Behavior6

Question#17

References9

Cross-Cultural Consumer Behavior

Case one

Lessons Learned

The lessons learned by Apple are valuable for its future product development and marketing function. One lesson is to read the needs of future customers. Electronic market is changing at a very rapid pace. The time to develop and market a product is squeezing day by day. The lifecycle of the technological products especially laptops and iPhones and more recently tablets is getting shorter. Competitors are entering in the market and bringing innovations. By the time companies develop and introduce a product after reading the customer's needs, the customers are moved on to next need. Companies need to identify the needs of future customers so they get plenty of time in developing and introducing products in the market. This is the lesson which co-founder of Apple Inc. Steve Jobs knew in his time and introduced iPods and Mac computers successfully, however, failed to read the advanced status of Japanese cell phone market. In fact, Apple was one of the few companies to realize the importance of taking customer input in developing products in early days (Amit & Zott, 2012).

Apple will need to make sure to develop and market cell phone products in markets as per their respective conditions and if not then at least develop estimates of sales after proper analysis of market. The technological status of the market is very necessary to understand what the consumer is expecting, what feature swill make customers satisfied and what value added features will make the customer feel delighted. The actual performance of the product must equal or exceed the expectations of the consumers. In case of Japanese market, the Apple Inc. failed to read the needs of the market and largely overestimated their sales. The Japanese consumers are well advanced from rest of the world and their needs are very advanced as well, like they seek functions of train pass and debit card in their cell phones. The touch screen element which is very popular in the rest of the world is not very much welcomed in the Japanese markets. Japanese consumers find it difficult to patronize such a feature after getting use to operate cell phones with buttons.

Cultural Differences and Marketing Strategy

Marketing mix is actually a tool for the firm to affect the consumer behavior in favor of their offerings. The marketing mix of any firm consists of several 'P's, some state it as 4, 7 and some even go to 9. However, 4Ps are most basic, Product, Price, Place and Promotion. The cultural differences of the country should derive the product development in order to be successful. However, it will be very difficult for the company to develop a separate product for each of the market as it will increase the cost of development and reduce the gains from it. What can be done is that, company should seek the input from the other markets it operates in and seek the ...