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Marketing & Global Cultural Identity

How globalization and corporate marketing has changed global culture

This analysis of different perspectives on worldwide marketing was written while I was studying globalization and cultural theory in London during a semester abroad. It was directly influenced by the fact that I was sitting in a Starbucks writing it in Central London, one of the international capitals of the world second only to New York.

Introduction

As large corporations spread across borders and become increasingly globalized, they require the expertise of the global marketing and advertising industries to shape brand personalities into something relevant to consumers. The discipline of account planning, which is a blend of empirical and qualitative research, has been specifically created to get inside the mind of the consumer and help brand builders get their brand associated with something that speaks to those consumers. If that something doesn’t exist yet, it can be created. “The intended target of the ad is encouraged to identify with the message, people and style represented in the ad. Thus advertisements help to orient individuals in society by providing them with images with which they can self-identify.” 1 The pervasiveness of branding brings up the question of how does it shape global culture and identity? Through the exchange between brands and consumers, global corporations create their identities and influence cultural identities around the world, while at the same time being defined by them. Whether this is a positive or negative or both depends on an individual’s perspective of what globalization is doing to marketing.

Globalization & Corporate Identity

Globalization is used to describe the phenomenon of the world becoming increasingly interconnected in the past several decades. According to David Held’s A Globalizing World,2 it is marked by regionalization, stretched social relations, intensification of flows, increasing interpenetration, and global infrastructure. Put simply, developments in technology have allowed and facilitate new and accelerated economic social interaction leading to actions in one part of the world affecting those in other parts. Most of the globalizing influences are from the developed, particularly American, organizations outwards since they have the capital to develop and take advantage of new technologies. New marketing techniques are tested in the American market, and if they are successful they can then be repackaged and exported elsewhere. Particular to marketing, as large corporations enter new markets, they call upon the marketing and advertising networks to handle the complex job of navigating cultural and personal identity boundaries while using new forms of media effectively. Corporate identity used to be mainly the domain of graphic design and restricted to logos, brochures, and letterheads. However, with the opening up of markets to many well capitalized competitors and the ability to mass produce goods relatively cheaply, identity for global organizations has become an issue that all branches of marketing must consider in order to differentiate one brand from another when there is quality parity. The logo is still crucial in branding because “by the force of ubiquity, [logos] have become the closest thing we have to an international language, recognized and understood in many more places than English.” 3 However, branding has developed beyond helping consumers identifying the maker of a product, and become a battle for the hearts and minds of the consumer. It does this through advertising that does more than just educate on products’ uses and benefits.

Selling a Lifestyle Instead of a Product

The big trend in global marketing is towards selling a lifestyle instead of products. As Naomi Klein writes in her book No Logo,3 Nike doesn’t sell shoes in its advertising, its marketing strategy is to sell the idea of Nike as the brand that embodies the ideals of sport. This allows Nike to sell anything remotely relating to sports from shoes to clothing to watches, making it a much more effective long-term strategy than marketing a single product in each individual ad. Companies such as Proctor and Gamble have set up special marketing subsidiaries to research consumer behavior and even attempt to influence it. Tremor is a P&G owned division that recruits teens that are brand leaders. These are the teens that are on the forefront of trends and influence what their peers purchase. Tremor conducts surveys on new products from P&G and partners to determine creative direction in ads. It also distributes swag in hopes that those teens will use it and show their friends. Similar and more direct approaches are taken by Nestlé through interactive advertising agency McElroy. Using Held’s concept of global infrastructure in the form of new communications technologies, McElroy develops lifestyle websites such as VeryBestBaby.com. The site educates pregnant and new mothers on how to take care of their new born babies nutritionally and socially while endorsing Nestlé owned product brands whenever relevant.

Selling Out

The merging of the commercial into personal identity and public culture is disturbing to some critics. The negative globalists in the globalization debate see it as leading to cultural homogenization and the destruction of identity replaced with identity based purely on consumption. Klein argues that global branding has gotten out of hand because it no longer merely appropriates items from culture. Through advertising, branding actually creates culture. “The company [Gap] has pioneered its own aesthetic, which spilled out into music, other advertisements…the Gap, it has become clear, is as much in the culture-creation business as the artists in its ads.” 3 Perhaps Klein’s example of the Gap creating culture is not so surprising given that it is a fashion company. However, companies in other industries less associated with culture creation now actively utilize this strategy. In the United Kingdom, the German mobile phone company Vodafone enlisted Bartle Bogle Hegarty for their television spot featuring the song “Under the Tree” by The Water Babies.4 In the ad, a lone girl is shown with the catchy Christmas tune playing in the background. She is then joined by a mass of people, some existing Vodafone celebrity spokesmen, under a large pine tree. The payoff is that they are united by their phones that light up the tree at the end. Using pop music and seasonality is nothing new in advertising except now it is the commercial that is selling the music rather than the other way around. The soundtrack was specifically created for the advertisement and was released as a single afterwards. Advertising is indeed creating culture rather than just reflecting it. Whether this trend of advertising creating culture is a positive or negative influence depends on one’s perspective. Clearly for Naomi Klein, this encroachment of branding into lifestyle marketing is something that needs to be changed. There are also visible movements of anti-globalization and anti-advertising sentiment that take a similar stance albeit with active resistance in the form of protests at times.

A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats

However, as in any debate, there are a variety of views along the spectrum of globalization regarding marketing and advertising. The positive globalists are those who see the benefits of globalization. They see the creation of wealth, new opportunities for individuals around the world, and a global society that is becoming more united. Usually, these optimists are corporate executives and global brand managers who have much to gain from the creation of a more global culture with fewer divisions. “Marketing managers in transnational firms assume that all consumers around the world aspire to an ‘American’ model of consumer society as the basis of their needs and desires.” 5 The consumer society model is seen to improve quality of life for all societies through the satisfying of consumers’ desires. Thus, the cultural standardization that allows for cheaper advertising through economies of scale and makes maintaining a consistent global brand image much easier is a positive influence.

Though much of the written discourse about globalization is negative, there are some intellectuals who find globalization a positive force. Thomas Friedman writes about some of the benefits in The World is Flat.6 He points out the fact that countries like India may be taking American jobs, but in return they are creating new markets for American exports that were bigger than before. In a similar vein, Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class7 champions the rise of a class that combines bourgeois with bohemian ideals which will be the engine of wealth creation in the 21st century. The class will be comprised of individuals such as the engineers, architects, designers, advertising professionals, and other significant contributors to culture that will make the world a supposedly better place.8 On the cultural front, global marketing has led to certain global cultures that unite peoples from across the globe through “supraterritorial identity…age, bodily condition, class, faith, gender, profession, race, sexual orientation, and belonging to the human species itself.” 9 The location transcending identities that are most successful in marketing are youth and luxury culture. The creative work promoting iPod in Tokyo or Shanghai is essentially the same as that in London or New York except for perhaps the language. “Much contemporary global culture has been youth culture. Global consumerism has linked young people across the planet through shared cult films, music hits, slang, and fashion trends.” 9 The same could be said of luxury culture with its often wordless ads connoting glamour and sensuality. Wealth seems to be a common language. Maybe this united marketing culture will lead to less worldwide conflict in the future by creating shared understanding, or maybe it will lead to a different type of conflict between consumer identities instead.

While Friedman’s and Florida’s hypothesis of creative individuals increasing in cultural and economic prominence has a high chance of proving itself, it only takes into account the professional class. While it is comforting to know that the young middle class and the wealthy of the world can peacefully agree on what brands to buy, what about the working class that makes up the vast majority of the world’s population? If their lives aren’t improved through globalization as well, no amount advertising will sell to them a product they cannot afford to buy. In this way, marketing depends on the success of globalization to improve global society as a whole and not marginalize other cultures and local consumers as the negative globalists imply globalization is doing. Therefore there must be a more balanced view.

The Middle Ground

The transformationalists take a middle ground approach to globalization by conceding that there are positives as well as negatives, and that the global is indeed growing but it is not usurping the national or local. One global culture theorist who takes this view is John Tomlinson. In his essay “Globalization and Cultural Identity” 10 he states, “The impact of globalization thus becomes more plausibly, a matter of the interplay of an institutional-technological impetus towards globality with counterpoised ‘localizing’ forces.” He goes on to develop the idea that there is actually amplification in significance of identity positions rather than the destruction of them as people map out who they are in relation to others around the globe. So what actually happens when global branding lands on foreign shores? China is a key case study because its market is rapidly developing and the urban population there has just recently been exposed to consumer culture in the past decade or so. In a study of “Chinese Consumer Readings of Global and Local Advertising Appeals” in Shenzhen,11 the findings were an interesting assimilation of the global and reaffirmation of local values. Western Caucasian models were found to work well in advertising for foreign or luxury goods that communicate social status and cosmopolitanism. They were also effective when used in sexually suggestive poses that wouldn’t be considered realistic or appropriate for Chinese models. However, when trying to promote products and brands using family values or moral appeals, the study found that Chinese models were found to be much more effective. This shows that on a superficial level, increasing globalism does lead to standardization or homogenization for the marketing of some brands. This is because people around the globe want those brands’ products precisely due to their Western nature. On the other hand, ads still need to feature local talent in order to be relevant when it comes to selling products with links to societal values. The traditional values ingrained in a society are not changing as fast as some critics fear. However, these values may continue to change over time as globalization progresses and cultures are exposed to different ideas.

Surprisingly, even a business newspaper like the Financial Times supports a transformationalist approach rather than the expected positive globalist one. In a special edition of FT Creative Business Scott Morrison writes, “A good ‘consumer experience’ in the US is not the same as one in Europe or Asia. Mobile phones are popular everywhere, but handsets in China tend to be smaller and more colourful, feature keystroke input pads, support different services and sound, well, Chinese.” 12 A respect for the local culture while marketing the global is good business practice after all. A study of another East Asian consumer society, the Japanese, is also telling of the way other cultures approach globalization. “In consumer cultures such as Japan the items consumed take on a symbolic value. Consumption becomes the main form of self-expression and the chief source of identity,” writes Michael Maynard in a dissertation on Japanese advertising.1 This consumer culture is what critics like Naomi Klein fear global societies are increasingly turning into. However, Maynard’s conclusion on the influx of Western influence takes a different perspective. “Contact with American culture has given Japan access to a wider cultural inventory of symbolic expression to refashion what already exists in Japanese communication. The predominant usage of English observed in the data [ads] should be thought of as Japan’s way of Occidentalizing the West.” Again the idea of multiple, or in this case hybrid, identities is supported rather than the destruction of identity. The transformationalists have found that non-Western cultures are more resilient than negative globalists give them credit for. Positive globalists might also feel that this is evidence for the benefits of globalization, but the caveat is that this cultural and identity hybridization rather than cultural colonialism is only occurring in countries like China and Japan which are not economically weak.

Nothing Has Changed

There is one more school of thought in the globalization debate, though much less prominent in marketing. The traditionalists argue that globalization is exaggerated in its purported impact. While this line of thinking is hard to support in light of the 1990s mergers and worldwide networks being established, one could argue that the essence of marketing has not changed. Brands are still brands. Even in the US, there are still both national and regional ad campaigns. Why is this special when applied to other countries? Another way to look at the traditionalist view is whether consistency in brand image across cultures is even necessary. This is the sentiment that Dave Freeman, head of TBWA’s Disruption Consultancy expressed even though many of TBWA’s major clients demand global branding. “Personally, I wonder why there is such an emphasis on keeping a ‘consistent global brand’ when the reality is that most consumers aren’t traveling around and noticing the difference. They are living in a context that is not about global integration.” 13 The local is still the most relevant to the traditionalist. Most global companies aren’t taking any chances though and will try to continue to merge global with local if possible.

Conclusion

Globalization and marketing are inextricably intertwined. How globalization develops in the future will greatly affect the direction these industries take. Since lifestyles are now being sold, it is bound to affect identity especially when exported to different parts of the world. Due to globalization, “identity shifts from a fixed set of characteristics determined by birth and ascription to a reflexive, ongoing, individual project.” 5 We must choose who we become. It is not predetermined for us. Global culture is being created but it is not completely replacing traditional customs and values. Standardization in advertising might be the Holy Grail for marketers but the reality is that hybrid cultural identities are being created. Tomlinson sums it up succinctly when he says, “Identity is not a zero-sum game.” 10 However, all of these global marketing issues are only fully applicable to certain countries with significant middle classes that can afford the consumer goods being marketed. Marketers and advertisers overlook many countries like those in Africa because there are no profitable markets or media infrastructure there. Not only is this division between the haves and have-nots an issue that will affect marketing and advertising in the future, but the market externalities created by advertising are also becoming an issue. Increased competition in the advertising market leads to visual pollution and kitsch as many brands vie for attention in the crowded media market. This has created some consumer backlash. In mild cases it leads to jaded and cynical consumers, but in the worst of cases it has fueled anti-globalization protests and anti-advertising groups. In spite of all the speculation by globalization theorists, the future of globalization and marketing will be interesting to see regardless of which perspective one adheres to.

  1. Maynard, M. (2001). The Consumption of Otherness and Preservation of Self: Images of the West in Japanese Teen Magazine Advertisements. Doctoral dissertation, New Brunswick: Rutgers.
  2. Held, D., (Ed.). (2004). A Globalizing World?: Culture, Economics, Politics. London: Routledge.
  3. Klein, N. (2002). No Logo. New York: Picador.
  4. The Water Babies - Under the Tree (2005). Video-C: See the Music. Accessed online on December 6, 2005, at http://www.video-c.co.uk/pop/radarwatch.asp?vidref=thew011&text=expanded&playback=S&player=QT
  5. Zukin, S. & Maguire, J. (2004). Consumers and Consumption. Annual Review of Sociology, 30, 173-197.
  6. Friedman, T. (2005). The World is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century. New York: Farrar, Strauss and Giroux.
  7. Florida, R. (2002). The Rise of the Creative Class: And How It’s Transforming Work, Leisure, Community and Everyday Life. New York: Basic Books.
  8. Goldman, D. (2002, July 15). Consumer Republic. Adweek, 43, 16.
  9. Scholte, J. (2005). Globalization: A Critical Introduction. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan.
  10. Tomlinson, J. (2003). Globalization and Cultural Identity. In D. Held & A.G. McGrew (Eds.), The Global Transformations Reader (p. 269-277). Cambridge: Polity.
  11. Zhou, N. & Belk, R. (2004). Chinese Consumer Readings of Global and Local Advertising Appeals. Journal of Advertising, 33, 63-76, Fall.
  12. Morrison, S. (2005, September 13). Design holds the key to cleaning up in world market. FT Creative Business Special Report, p. 2.
  13. Freeman, D. (2005). Email interview with author on 13 October 2005.
Creative Commons LicenseMarketing & Global Cultural Identity by Daniel Yang is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License.