As you begin to move beyond your initial outline and summary, your next step will be drafting. Drafting is a very important step in the writing process, but by no means should it be considered the final stage. In it you should focus on putting as much on paper as you can including your Purpose Statement (though it may eventually change), your supporting evidence, and analysis of the evidence. It is less important to worry about having all the correct words and punctuation as it is to work hard to express as much as you can about the topic. When you have completed the Rough Draft, you should be 90% done with the Final Project.
If it helps, think back to when you drafted your purpose statement in your outline. How has your work up to this point worked toward solving the issue you have identified? What have you unearthed as you have dug into your topic? Addressing similar questions to those from the earlier assignment in your introduction may help you find direction in your draft:
What is the problem?
When does the problem occur?
Who and/or what does it affect?
What are the potential solutions for the problem?
How can you present the solution(s) in a fair way to your audience, respecting their perspective(s)?
Your rough draft will consist of the bulk of your proposal’s content, and should include your proposal broken into four sections:
Purpose: Indicate the purpose statement and scope of your problem – tell us what you will be solving and why you believe it is an important issue.
Problem: Share what the actual problem is and any history that you have regarding it or additional problems that will branch from this initial problem.
Solution: Provide what your solution(s) to the problems are, and outline the steps that you think are needed to get to the solution.
Conclusion: Wrap it all up and provide a conclusion to the reader. Be sure to engage your reader by applying effective organization, appropriate tone, and clear usage.
Also, provide a reference page with a minimum of four references properly formatted in APA style. At least two of your references should be scholarly sources. At this stage, the draft should be between 3-to-5 pages plus the reference page.
Writing the Rough Draft
Purpose
Marketing is one of the essential activities in an organization since it determines how the products or services of a company are sold to final consumers to generate revenue and profits. While marketing has always been important, it has become more complicated with the global interconnectedness that requires marketers to know about cross-cultural communication (Tantawy & George, 2016). Current evidence suggests that assuming that cultural demographics create the primary market for a company’s product may deny an opportunity for marketers to sell to people from other countries effectively. The current project proves the need for marketers to focus on demand across cultures rather than segmenting the market using demographical factors. One of the reasons for failing in marketing across cultures is limiting their knowledge to demographic differences, such as language and communication strategies. For example, learning about a different culture’s language or communication styles is no longer enough for effective marketing. Thus, the project proposes the need to know and understand how demand for products and services differs from one cultural group to another to address the problem. While the knowledge helps them know how to align their product and promotion to the identified demands, they become more relevant to consumers who will be willing to listen and improve the chances of buying from them.
Problem
Marketing has changed considerably due to global interconnectedness. Companies are increasingly expanding their operations and selling their goods and services across national borders. However, while the changes become evident, marketers are not adequately prepared to handle marketing across cultures. They are not ready to handle problematic customers due to cultural and linguistic barriers. Schools and experience train marketers to sell products and services in other countries, but they are rarely informed that they may encounter difficult situations due to cultural barriers. The problem is not even the linguistic differences but the gaps in understanding that demands differ from one culture to another (Nwankwo, 2015). Marketing in diversity becomes the most challenging problem marketers have to deal with in the globalized business context. Regardless of the problem, organizations still have limited efforts to develop knowledge and improve marketing across cultures.
As a result of focusing on product knowledge only, marketers leave the company with adequate product knowledge but inadequate skills to deal with communication problems they encounter in real-life situations when dealing with customers. The experience becomes an eye-opener for most marketers. They learn that they should focus on developing, negotiating, and selling in a culturally diverse environment. For example, Han (2021) provides marketers with the fundamental idea that marketing for different cultures differs and that they should, for example, learn how to sell differently to collectivist vs. individualistic cultures. The disappointment of a lost sale makes them realize that learning another language is not enough. Furthermore, many companies focus on demographics, including cultural characteristics, but fail to consider the role of demand in the decision-making process. Understanding how demand differs across cultures will help them communicate the message about their products better and improve understanding, increasing the chances of closing a deal.
Solution or Plan
Considering that marketers continue to play a vital role in business, they need to be equipped with the necessary knowledge to effectively sell to people from other cultures. Therefore, the solution to the problem includes efforts to educate marketers and develop the skills required to sell across cultures. Companies should design training programs to make their marketers more competent at marketing to diverse cultures. They should focus on the interaction between national cultures and marketing strategies that inform the organic post-consumption satisfaction of consumers (Song et al., 2018). The idea relates to changes in demand across cultures. Thus, since the demands differ, marketers should be trained to understand that even the ways they meet them are also different. Therefore, they cannot approach them through the traditional approaches to marketing.
Marketers in the globalized society should avoid traditional approaches that assume teaching marketers different languages and communication styles is enough to enhance competence. Their training should include a more detailed approach to marketing to different cultures, including identifying diverse demands and meeting them effectively. For example, they should be trained to understand that the demands in individualistic cultures differ from those in collective cultures and that the differences play a crucial role in how organizations approach advertising appeals. Besides, product or service evaluations across cultures differ (Song et al., 2018). The knowledge will prepare them to handle customers from any of the two cultures.
Training should help marketers to understand the meaning and implications of culture in marketing. For example, the programs should include a detailed definition of culture as a choice and not a birthright. They should learn that a shared passion and experience influence how people interact with products and services. Hence, they learn that the nature of the advertisement used for a product and service determines success in a diverse cultural environment (Zhu et al., 2021). Marketers equipped with such knowledge will develop effective strategies to market to diverse cultures. Thus, training for effective marketing should integrate the knowledge of diverse languages and communication approaches with an understanding of how people from different cultures demand and use products. They will also learn to adapt their marketing to those demands and needs to sell more. Overall, the solution to the problem of marketing across cultures is more targeted training to understand fundamental differences between cultures. Training will also equip marketers with the knowledge of how to represent their companies to other cultures through effective communication and negotiation. Such experience will require more than product knowledge. It will include real knowledge about dealing with people from different cultural contexts and persuading them to develop product and brand loyalty. Thus, investing in effective training of cross-cultural marketing will improve marketing for companies in the globalized world.
Conclusion
Marketing is one of the crucial functions of a company since it guarantees revenue and returns on investment. Thus, marketers are critical of its success since they market and sell products to diverse customers. Increased globalization has added the demand for effective marketing to people from different cultures. They should learn how marketing to the home culture is different from others. Thus, traditional marketing approaches are no longer effective in this environment. To become effective, marketing managers should train their teams to recognize the real meaning of culture and related differences. The point at which they meet their customers is multicultural in demand, not simply demographics. Developing such knowledge will eradicate negative experiences with customers and improve sales. Overall, the knowledge will help them to recognize the demand and meet the needs using their products.
References
Han, S. (2021). A Comparison of Government and Public Institutions Advertising Appeals in Collectivistic and Individualistic Cultures. Journal of the Korea Convergence Society, 12(7), 153-158.
Nwankwo, S. (2015). Marketing in Diversity: An Ethnography of two Cultures. In Proceedings of the 1996 Multicultural Marketing Conference (pp. 359-362). Springer, Cham.
Song, R., Moon, S., Chen, H. A., & Houston, M. B. (2018). When marketing strategy meets culture: the role of culture in product evaluations. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 46(3), 384-402.
Tantawy, R. Y., & George, B. P. (2016). Cultures within national cultures: international marketing within the domestic marketing environment. Economic Review: Journal of Economics and Business, 14(1), 26-34.
Zhu, Y., Wang, V. L., Wang, Y. J., & Wei, J. J. (2021). How to craft humorous advertisements across diverse cultures? Multi‐country insights from Brazilian, Chinese, and American consumers. International Journal of Consumer Studies.