MarketingSherpa Blog

We frequently receive questions from our email subscribers asking marketing advice. Instead of hiding those answers in one-to-one email communication, we occasionally publish edited excerpts of some of them here on the MarketingSherpa blog so they can help other readers as well. If you have any questions, let us know.

Dear MarketingSherpa: Hi, Daniel Burstein. I appreciate it that you are so warm-heart and nice to offer to help.

Currently, I am a graduate, major in Social Media and Mobile Marketing. I want to seek a Summer Intern in the field of Marketing or Digital Marketing, either full-time or part-time. I am an International student from China.

According to my current situation, do you have some advice to give me? When you are free, could you let me know your suggestions. I am so grateful to hear from you.

Regards,

Dear Reader: Congratulations on your academic achievements and thanks for writing. I assume you are looking for an internship here in the US?

I’ll be honest, the fact that you’re a non-native speaker could be a challenge.

So …

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According to eMarketer, a marketing research company, ecommerce sales are expected to hit $1.771 trillion this year — with $1.233 trillion of those sales coming from outside North America.

Keeping this figure in mind, I sat down with Don Davis, Editor-in-Chief, Internet Retailer, after his trip to Shanghai to get some tips and advice for you as you expand your ecommerce business internationally:

We talked about the similarities and differences to the U.S. market, challenges of fulfillment and the important of trust to the Chinese consumer.

For example, when discussing trust, Don said, “Ratings and reviews are really important in China, because there are still a lot of fakes.”

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The world is getting faster.

In the past few years, the term globalization has been used to describe an unprecedented cultural, economic and political phenomenon that has fundamentally changed the world.

With faster intercontinental travel and almost instantaneous communication technologies, societies, economies and individuals have become more interdependent than ever before.

As globalization spreads more wealth from developed nations and into developing ones, a new global middle class has risen with an even greater desire to consume than 1950s America. According to Internetworldstats.com, the amount of people who have access to the internet has increased 676.32% in the last 14 years. Most of that growth occurred in the continents of Africa and Asia.

So what does that mean to a 21st century marketer?

It means that a taxi driver in Senegal can watch a Yankees game, purchase Yankees related merchandise and spread the Yankees brand to a whole new generation of consumers.

Now imagine if you could deliberately break into this new emerging market.

What would you do? How would you connect with your new potential customers and increase your brand awareness at the same time?

Most companies do it by creating and promoting culturally specific products that vary depending on the region. McDonalds is great at this. Ever heard of the Teriyaki McBurger?

It’s a product exclusive to its Japanese market and one of McDonalds Japan’s biggest sellers.

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The ladder of success no longer has certain rungs that must be met. Now, companies are placing a greater emphasis on company culture, and are looking for people who will fit into that.

In the days when large corporations were the trendsetters of the business world, you could get ahead by following a certain set of rules. As the recession knocked down some of these traditional companies from their former glory, a new way of doing business was highlighted.

Facebook, Google, Twitter, Apple and a thousand others like them ditched the suits and turned casual Friday into a week-long institution. Ping pong tables (like the one here at MECLABS) replaced conference tables and office spaces began providing an environment that would encourage employees to “think different.”

Companies are looking beyond info from your resume, and wanting to get to know you. Zappos, for instance, has said that in their personality-focused hiring process, they ask themselves if the person being interviewed is someone they would want to get a beer with.

As personality and corporate culture become a bigger proponent of the hiring process, it may be time to make yourself known and stop hiding behind a generic black and white, 12-point Times New Roman font resume.

An increasing amount of companies want to see that you have unique, unconventional skills to bring to their team, instead of checking off a list of qualifications on your resume.

Establishing your personal brand online can be the most effective way to get – and keep – a company’s attention.

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I had the pleasure of speaking with Dennis Hernreich, EVP/COO/CFO, Casual Male Retail Group last week. We mostly discussed how the U.S.-based big and tall male apparel retailer is expanding into Europe, England in particular, and the lessons Hernreich has gained from the experience.

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The Internet has opened up the entire world to retail marketers. Anyone who can reach a computer to go online can buy your product.

Global ecommerce marketing has a lot of challenges, though, like translation. Unless you have a team of translators on staff, you’re going to need some help localizing your marketing copy.

Here is some advice from Larry Arnold, Manager, Consumer Technology Publications, Garmin, that could help you organize a diverse translation process.

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