Achieving impact on a global scale. It’s a business objective held by brand marketers around the world. But translating a global strategy into local campaigns that resonate with audiences is a communications challenge to take seriously. Here we look at how you can grow your brand in multiple markets by adopting the right global-to-local approach.
Review your operational model
Rolling out a global campaign means identifying the best operational model for your marketing activities. Do you want a centralised model? This is where a global team makes decisions and manages budgets, with local teams implementing campaigns in-market and validating localised assets. Or would you prefer a decentralised model? This is where local marketing teams manage their budgets and run their campaigns with limited involvement from the global team. Or how about a hybrid model with local and global teams making joint strategic decisions?
There’s no right or wrong setup, but implementing an operational model requires you to assess your current situation. Whether you’ve run global campaigns before or are about to go international for the first time, analyse your current setup to identify who is currently responsible for making decisions and holding budgets. You can then consider the steps you’ll need to take as an organisation to get your local and global teams operating most effectively. This means encouraging a collaborative spirit between local, regional and global teams, ensuring information and communication flows easily between teams.
Build creative teams that think like a local
For a brand to build awareness and engage audiences globally, it must establish itself locally. This doesn’t mean rolling out the same campaign in the UK and the UAE. Instead, take your global concept and tailor it to every market in which it will appear. How? By building creative teams that think like a local.
You may choose to build your team in-house. Or you might seek out the input of creative agencies. You could also rely on the expertise of local resources and external partners. Many brands foster this collaborative approach quite effectively, with their external team focusing on the big idea and their internal team owning the brand and producing the less high-profile creative.
As well as your creative team, you’ll need a media partner with a strong understanding of local realities and regulations and established contacts with publishers in all your target markets. You’ll also need project managers to help you plan and roll out your campaign globally. As with your creative team, a project manager can work in-house, or you may want to use a global implementation partner who will take on the project management function for you.
You must also consider the production and post-production capabilities required to produce and deliver large-scale campaign content and find language experts to help you convey your message accurately.
Remember, when selecting the experts you need, it’s vital to identify people and partners with global marketing campaign experience. Because no matter how creative or successful they might be in their area of expertise, they need to be able to bring local insights into their approach if your brand is to grow in every market.
Avoid the common mistakes
As already outlined, success in local markets requires cultural adaptation and creative localisation. Get this right and grow your brand by avoiding the common pitfalls of global marketing and making your creative ideas travel with impact. For example, getting localised copy wrong can result in funny, embarrassing and even disastrous brand anecdotes. That’s why choosing the right people to write and validate your copy is key. In addition, brands need to tread carefully and assess the risks associated with their creative choices – risks not only to their campaign performance but to their reputation.
If you’re planning to launch a campaign across different markets, we always suggest carrying out an extensive in-market cultural consultation to make sure your creative works everywhere. Find out more by getting in touch today.