The first lectures

Today was our first day of being back at school after Christmas. I was ready to take in new ideas and expand my knowledge. 

International marketing

This is the topic of our course and I find it extremely interesting. I have been fascinated by the differences and the similarities that countries and cultures have for many years now. I also find the mind-behavior connection fascinating and what drives people to behave in certain way towards products, brands, colors, smells, music... This is why this topic is very interesting to me.

Our teacher Ulla Puustelli started with saying that the most important difference between marketing and international marketing is the environment they occur in. The buying habits, purchasing power, competitors, markets, etc. have a huge affect on how the marketing in a certain country/culture should be addressed. This is obvious to me, but what is the thing you need to change when going into new markets? I believe that knowing the culture and the habits of the people in the area you want to market in always helps the marketing to succeed.

We had the chance to give ideas on the topics we want to make a wiki on in groups during the course. This in my opinion was great and because I'm reading a book called "The Tell-Tale Brain" by V.S. Ramachandran I wanted to make a wiki on neuromarketing or more specifically if there is a way to market to the brain-not the culture? Are there some aesthetics that everyone appreciates? I have just started reading this book and I just want to read and read, because it is that interesting! I hope/think I can somehow relate on what I learn from this book into this course/blog.

Ulla gave us an example about the Finnish brand Lumene that tried to launch itself into the Swedish markets and failed twice before making it on the third time. They didn't know the differences in the Swedish environment and got caught with their good brand image and position on the Finnish markets.