Question for BS: Given the fact that the different carrier partners are saying different things, how and when is G* going to craft a unified, simple marketing plan/pricing plan that customers can rely upon?
JGoren, catching up--I think one of the selling points of G* is that they don't have to craft a globally unified marketing message. Upon rollout, each provider will have a monopoly in marketing within its area.
That message can and should be different for different countries (and even different in different parts of a country, perhaps, or to different market segments). That different countries should receive different marketing plans was a hard-won lesson of US multinationals in the 1980's. I was posted in Japan at the time, and watched a number of consumer products launched--and failed--because the same approach was taken in Japan as the US. The number one mistake in Japan, for instance, was to compete on price. That made the products appear cheap, and they never recovered, as far as I know. A number of consumer companies tried exporting their marketing and advertising messages along with their products. And those messages fell flat.
One way in which buyers' preferences can be demonstrated to vary by country is to look at marketing polls, in which consumers are asked to rate the different traits of a product (eg, price, size, color, options). These rarely (never?) remain the same in different countries. Companies that crafted messages individually for respective markets had a much higher chance of success in those markets.
Best,
JS |
