Adaptation Strategies in International Marketing: A Detailed Report

This report provides a detailed analysis of adaptation strategies in international marketing. It begins with an executive summary highlighting the significance of internationalization and the adaptation strategy, which emphasizes localization. The report explores the factors influencing strategy choices in international markets, including language, taste, culture, consumer habits, and economic factors. It delves into the localization school of thought, emphasizing non-standardized advertising and the importance of considering local market differences. The report also examines the adaptation strategy as a customer-oriented approach, using examples like Nokia and McDonald's to illustrate how companies tailor their products and marketing to different regions. The report further discusses the causes of adaptation strategy in the marketing mix, focusing on product, price, place, and promotion adjustments. It offers insights into the benefits and drawbacks of adaptation strategies, providing a comprehensive understanding of managing across borders in the global market.

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MANAGING ACROSS BORDERS

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Executive summary:
Internationalization is the basic practice that has been done by the organizations these days. This
report discusses about the strategies that has been used by the companies to expand their
business in the international market. The major strategy that has been focussed upon is the
adaptation strategy that is about the strategy of localization. In this strategy the local touch of the
culture and the choices has been observed in the products and the marketing strategies of the
company. This suggests that the company used to make different strategies for different
countries. The discussion in this report initiates with the explanation of the international market
and the factors that affect the choice of strategy of the company. The later part discusses about
the adaptation strategy and its features. The report than throws some light on the advantages and
the disadvantages of the adaptation strategy used by the companies. The overall report provides
great information about the strategy of adaptation.

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Table of Contents
Introduction:...............................................................................................................................................1
International market:..................................................................................................................................2
Factors that affect the choice of strategy:...................................................................................................2
The localization school of thought:..............................................................................................................3
Adaptation as customer’s orientation strategy:..........................................................................................4
Causes of adaptation strategy in marketing mix:........................................................................................5
Benefits of adaptation strategies:...............................................................................................................6
Drawbacks of adaptation strategy:..............................................................................................................7
Conclusion:..................................................................................................................................................8
References:..................................................................................................................................................8

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Introduction:
Globalization has supported the companies to expand their business at global level. The
companies try to set up their business in the international market so that they can cover large
masses of customers and thus enhance their business as well as revenue. Globalization has made
this easy for the companies to go global (Aaker and McLoughlin, 2009). It has been analysed
that the nature of market and culture at different countries is very different. Thus, the companies
have to make a strategic choice of standardization or adaptations in the international market, if it
wants to settle their business at the international land. Standardization strategy allows the
company to be standard with their products and the strategies that has been used at the parent
country by the company and using the same within the international market. On the other hand,
adaptation strategy is the strategy that allows the organization to adapt the local market culture
and alter the traditional or original strategies or products of the parent company according to the
host country. This is the situation where the company has to take decisions over marketing and
the product strategies that have been implemented in the different part of the world for expansion
of the business (Turnbull and Valla, 2013). This essay mainly focuses on developing the
understanding of different aspect of adaptation straggles and the process of adapting the same in
the international market. The discussion follows with various techniques that have been used in
adaptation strategies in terms of market and the products. Managing across borders is the term
used to manage the international market. The process of selecting one of the marketing strategies
is followed by the companies who want to operate in international market. Following the whole
process allow the company to adapt one of the strategies. Adaptation strategy is basically used by
those companies who wants to have local touch in their products and wants the people to feel the
connection with the brands (Cateora, 2008). It has been analysed that adaptation strategy
provides many benefits to the companies such as localization and connect to the local people,
better customer’s satisfactions, good relations with the customers and the foreign government
etc. In addition to these benefits, some of the disadvantages have also been faced by the
companies if it adopts the localization strategy. Some of the disadvantages are loss of actual
identity of the firm; more time and effort is required to analyse different market and developing
different strategies, high cost etc. the discussion below decreases the topic in detail and provides
the understanding of various aspects of adaptation strategies in global market.

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International market:
As the term suggests, international market is the market that is in the foreign country. Marketing
in international land is the very common trend that has been found in the businesses these days.
Many researchers have been taken place and are still in progress with regards to the
understanding of purchase behaviour and demands of the people in different countries (Terpstra,
Foley and Sarathy, 2012). International marketing is also defined as the process of identifying
the demands of the customers across the boundaries and fulfilling them with some of the
strategies. The companies have to take global decisions in terms of marketing to the international
land by making variations in some of the marketing mix elements. Companies tend to face many
challenges in case if international marketing regarding the strategies to adopt (Soares,
Farhangmehr and Shoham, 2007). They generally have two choices, standardization and
adaptation.
Factors that affect the choice of strategy:
The alteration in the marketing mix elements of the company for international marketing is
required because of the differences in various factors across borders. Some of the factors that
drive the change in marketing mix elements are:
Language: language is the very important factor that drives the change in the original strategy of
the company in terms of marketing in international market. This is because different countries
have different native languages (Doole and Lowe, 2008). It is not possible for the organizations
to advertise their products in the same parent language in all over the world.
Taste: for the companies which deal with food products, it is very difficult to serve every
international market with similar products. This is because the taste and the choices if the people
in different countries are different.
Culture: It is a known fact that values and culture of the people in different countries are very
different. Thus, serving each and every market with the similar products and by the same
strategies cannot work at every place (Pappu, Quester and Cooksey, 2007).
Consumer habits:

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As far as the consumer behaviour and the habits are considered, it has been analysed that it is not
necessary that the products for that is very popular in one country could be popular in another
company as well. This is because of the change in consumer habits and their behaviour to
purchase the products. This let the organization change the price, products and the marketing
strategies.
Economic factors: different countries have different type of economic level (Griffin and Pustay,
2012). It is not necessary that every country can afford to buy the products in high price and thus
the companies have to later their products quality as well as the price level according to the
economic conditions of the country.
The localization school of thought:
The localization school of though is also called as adaptation school of thought. This suggests
that there should be non-standardized advertising approach in the international market. It talks
about the different advertising campaigns that have been formed by the companies for different
markets even in the similar country or in international country (Zhou, Wu and Barnes, 2012).
The school argues that there are different people in different country as well as different people
in the similar country according to the region. It has been analysed that when the localized
strategy is applied in terms of deciding the marketing plan then it is necessary to take into
account the differences in the market type and sixe of different places. Localization or the
adaptation strategy for each and every place should have the local touch in them so that the
people of that place can feel related to that products or service (Cadogan, 2012). The differences
that majorly needs to be considered are culture, language, demography, economy, beliefs etc. it
has been recommended to all the MNC’s by the experts that they should choose the adaptation or
the localization strategy because it is very important to overcome the cultural barriers that exists
at every place. It is not possible that single marketing campaign can attract the customers of all
places (Vrontis and Thrassou, 2007). This school of thought generally considered the differences
at the places but fails to acknowledge the similarities and homogeneity of the market at different
places. This suggests that the companies can use the standardized strategy only when the market
is similar. This requires the companies to conduct the market analysis before deciding over the
marketing strategy or before releasing any of the products (Griffith, 2010). This is because the

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places with similar market conditions and taste of the customers can be served with similar
market strategies.
Adaptation as customer’s orientation strategy:
Adaptation strategy is about changing the different aspects of the products and services
according to the international market needs. It provides the benefit of meeting the different needs
of the different market all over the world. This allows the companies to have greater achievement
of customer satisfaction (Chung, 2009). Developing products requires a process be followed. In
this process, the stage of product development needs the alteration according to the differences at
the different places that needs to be served by that product. There are many factors that support h
strategy of adaptation over the strategy of standardization. The factors are the government
policies of different places, condition of consumption and consumer behaviour. Most of the
companies believe in adapting the strategies and altering their marketing mix. There are many
examples that can be studied to have an idea about the difference in strategies of the company at
different places. For example, Nokia is the firm that sell its products with low cost strategy in
Africa. This is because the consumer buying power of Africa is low as compared to other
countries (Turnbull and Paliwoda, 2012). On the other hand, Nokia serves the people with
smartphones like Lumia which are of high price to the places like North America and Europe
where the buying power of the consumers is high in nature.
McDonalds also uses the strategy of adaptation in order to serve the international market. The
company believes in analysing the market and the taste of the people before entering the same.
As the McDonalds men is considered it started its operation by serving Hamburgers to the people
and succeeded. But, when the company enters the country like India, it takes different approach.
The failure of KFC in India at tits initial sate suggests that McDonald should come with some of
the veg burgers in India in order to attract the customers because most of the people there are
vegans. This suggests that adaptation strategy of the company was customers oriented.
It has been analysed that the change in the strategy of the company is the response to the changes
in the market of the place. Adaptation strategies at different place also help the company to

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reduce the risks of failure. This is because; it is using different strategies at different places. One
of the strategies can fail but all the strategies cannot be failed.
Causes of adaptation strategy in marketing mix:
Marketing mix contains the elements of the market such as products, price, place and promotion.
Below discussion argues about the cause that drives the changes in the elements of the marketing
mix when the adaptation strategy has been implemented:
1. Product: the various causes that drive the changes in the products of the company if
adaptation strategy has been implemented are government regulations, habits of the
consumers, difference in culture and standards of the products. This is because it is
required by the company to follow different regulation set of the respective government
at different places (Zhou and Li, 2010). The consumer habits can also be different and
thus affect the type of products that can be used by them. As far as the strategy of Nestle
in considered, it released various range of Kit Kat in Japan. This is because the bar got
very famous and popular in the country. Dominos and Dunkin Donuts are more examples
of the companies that make alterations in the r products in order to serve different
markets according to the relevant culture and choices.
2. Price: different markets have different profit and sale volume. This this creates difference
in the consumer power of buying things (Chhokar, Brodbeck and House, 2013). It needs
to be considered by the multinational companies in ore to set the prices at different places
or market at international level.
3. Place: Place involves the factors such as nature of the market, characteristics of the
customers of that place, laws and legislations etc. these factors drives the companies to
make the changes in choosing the way or the location from where the products needs to
be distributed.
4. Promotion: there are different ways in which the customers can be attracted towards the
products. Thus, it is required by the company to make changes in the marketing and
promotional techniques to serve different markets (Tempel and Walgenbach, 2007). In

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this process, the company needs to consider the market conditions and the type of the
customers.
Benefits of adaptation strategies:
As far as the benefits of adaptation strategy is considered, it has been analysed that there are
many benefits of the strategy. Some of them are discussed below:
1. Customer satisfaction: As discussed that adaptation strategy is the strategy that allow the
organization adapt the local touch of the place where the products needs to be released or
marketed. This helps in making connection with the customers (Steers, Sanchez-Runde
and Nardon, 2010). As the customers feel related to the products, they will definitely be
satisfied with the products. If there is no relativity between the products and the
customers, then it will be difficult for the company to sell the products in that market
(Michaels, 2008).
2. Reduction of failure risk: as adaptation strategy helps in serving each and every market
with different strategies, it reduces the risk if failure of the strategy. One strategy can be
failed but all cannot be failed. In case of standardization, the similar strategy is used to
different market and thus there is high risk of failure at every place.
3. Rapid response to changes: It has been analysed that adaptation strategy helps in
changing and altering the original strategy or the products of the company so that the
local market needs can be fulfilled. This enables the company to respond to the changes
that occur in the market rapidly (Ghemawat, 2007). This is because the company has
already made the strategy and the products according to the needs and environment of the
international market. If there are any changes in the market then it will be easy for the
company to adapt such changed in the strategies as well.
4. Effective communication: This is the most obvious benefit that can be achieved by the
companies using the adaptation strategy in the international market. This is because of the
company is adapting the localization strategy; it can easily communicate with the local
people of the place (Deresky, 2017). Standardization strategy allows them to

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communicate in the uniform manner at all places. It is not necessary that every country
can have same level of understanding and thus becomes difficult to deal with the market.
5. Good relationship with foreign government: implementing the adaptation strategy also
helps in developing good relationship with the foreign country government. This is
because, in the adaptation strategy; the company generally follows the regulations formed
by the international government and also have the local touch in their products.
6. Ease of access: It is also one of the obvious benefits that can enjoy by the companies
adopting the localization strategy.
Drawbacks of adaptation strategy:
1. Low speed of implementation: It has been analysed that adaptation strategy is the strategy
that requires the companies to conduct the analysis of different market and their culture in
order to about the same. This requires a lot of time for the company to implement such
changes at every place (Knight and Landres, 2013). The process of gaining the
knowledge of different market takes a lot of efforts and time and thus the market strategy
also delays. Standardization strategy can easily be implemented as only on strategy has to
be implemented at every place.
2. Compromise with the core competitive advantage: adaptation strategy is implemented to
the large scale in different countries with different variations. These variations results in
loss of original identity of the company (Davis, 2007). As far as the brand like NIKE is
concerned, it has been analysed that the major identity of the company is dynamism and
active life style. As the company market its products with the slogan called “Just Do It”.
There are possibilities that the company can lose its identity at different places if the
localization touch is being imposed on the strategies of marketing at different countries
(Jones, 2007).
Conclusion:
This report concludes that there are two types of strategies that can be used by the companies at
international market. One of the strategies is standardization and another one is adaptation
strategy. There are different factors that affect the decision of choosing the relevant strategy to
serve the market. Some of the factors are language, culture, customer behaviour etc. Adaptation

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strategy is most popular and has been used by many companies now a day. Adaptation strategy is
the strategy that deals with making the alterations in the original strategy of the company in
consideration with the differences in the different market. The major elements that are been
altered by the company in the adaptation strategies are product, price, place and promotion.
These are the marketing mix elements that need to be changed according to the condition and the
situations at the international market. There are many benefits of using adaptation strategy that
can be enjoyed by the company such as localization and connect to the local people, better
customer’s satisfactions, good relations with the customers and the foreign government etc. In
addition to these benefits, some of the disadvantages have also been faced by the companies if it
adopts the localization strategy. Some of the disadvantages are loss of actual identity of the firm;
more time and effort is required to analyse different market and developing different strategies,
high cost etc.
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