White is the colour of the bride – or isn’t it? – Understanding and Researching culture – A Secondary Approach

TNS Business Intelligence Silja Maria Wiedeking Understanding and Researching Culture – A Secondary Approach White Paper Silja Maria Wiedeking TNS Business Intelligence 2010 e Silja-maria.wiedeking@tns-infratest.com t 0049 (0)89 5600 1171 www.tns-infratest-bi.com www.tnsglobal.com/businessintelligence Understanding and Researching Culture – A Secondary Approach 1 TNS Business Intelligence Silja Maria Wiedeking TITLE: Understanding and Researching Culture – A Secondary Approach NAME: Silja Maria Wiedeking POSITION: Marketing & Research Consultant TEAM/COUNTRY: TNS Business Intelligence / Germany KEY WORDS Desk Research, Secondary Market Research, Cultural tradition, diversity, understanding culture Synopsis: In the modern and globalised world, people and companies can go anywhere they choose to. They can enter foreign countries and markets and they can build personal and business relations in any place in the world. However, what they often cannot is understanding local cultures and habits. It is best to know the culture of the country or society one is in. This, some might argue, is a universally known fact, common sense. After all, the popular proverb does not say for nothing: when in Rome do as the Romans do. But how do you actually know what the Romans do, how they think and how their culture influences their lives? This is where secondary market research, so-called desk research, comes in. Desk research focuses not on surveyed customer preferences or opinions but on the already published output of a culture or society. This paper looks at how desk research can help approaching diversity, foreign cultures and learning to adapt to their particularities. This is as important for business life – e.g. for the introduction of new products into an overseas market or business contacts away from home – as it is for people’s daily lives in this globalised world that moves closer and closer together and yet remains diverse and multi-facetted in its every fibre. On the basis of cultural theories, the article uses case studies from the work of TNS Business Intelligence, the desk research specialist of the TNS group, to explore the cultural element of secondary market research. Symbolisms and connotations of culture and the development of so-called myths are discussed and put into the context of business life. In addition, the article looks into shifting and moving cultures that companies, marketers, politics and researchers are faced with on a daily basis. Understanding and Researching Culture – A Secondary Approach 2 TNS Business Intelligence Silja Maria Wiedeking Understanding and Researching Culture – A Secondary Approach It was the cultural theorist John Fiske who said: “The power to be different is the power that maintains social difference, social diversity.”1 A to-the-point statement that bears as much truth as it bears challenges for advertisers, marketers, companies that work on a global scale and market researchers. The modern world our business processes take place in is far from being homogeneous. It is a world that is defined by diversity - regionally, politically, socially and culturally. The faster globalisation progresses, the faster political and social systems are changing and re-building and the faster cultures and people develop and evolve. “We need to think […] of the people as a multiple and constantly changing concept, a huge variety of social groups accommodating themselves with, or opposing themselves to, the dominant value system in a variety of ways”2, says Fiske. But what does this theory mean in practice? It means that no culture is the same and that even within the same social environment different cultures and sub-cultures can exist and emerge. When looking at one country or region, one cannot speak of the prevailing culture but needs to take into account ever-changing cultural diversity. This is the challenge of the modern globalised world. People and companies can go anywhere they choose to. They can enter foreign countries and markets and they can build personal and business relations in any place in the world. However, what they often cannot is understanding local culture and habits. A rather telling example for this is a British bank’s “gesture campaign”, which was broadcast on television some years ago. It featured a young man, driving through South America on his motorbike. Wherever he went, he met people who signalled him with their hands spread out and thumb and index finger forming a circle, that everything was great. When the man finally arrived in Brazil and ate in a small roadside bar, he signalled the chef that the food was nice but unwittingly offended him with the very gesture that he had seen across the continent. “All over South America this gesture means it is everything okay, apart from Brazil where it is rather rude.” Never underestimate local knowledge is the spot’s message. 1 Fiske, J., The Popular Economy, in Storey, J. (ed.) Cultural Theory and Popular Culture, Prentice Hall, 1998, p.505 2 ibid., p. 513 Understanding and Researching Culture – A Secondary Approach 3 TNS Business Intelligence Silja Maria Wiedeking The Romans-question – secondary cultural research It is best to know the culture of the country or society one is in. This, some might argue, is a universally known fact, common sense. After all, the popular proverb does not say for nothing: when in Rome do as the Romans do. But how do you actually know what the Romans do, how they think and how their culture influences their lives? How does one avoid the pitfalls of local cultures and not end up in a situation where one offends another person, for instance a business partner, just like the young motor cyclist in the television advert? In other words, what are the dos and don’ts of particular cultures? What do they associate with particular gestures, signs or even events in history? What are their cultural interpretations and connotations? This is where secondary market research, so-called desk research, comes in. Desk research focuses not on surveyed customer preferences or opinions but on the already published output of a culture or society. Trained desk research specialists sift through vast amounts of published information, gather data, uncover particularities and analyse and compare their meaning and importance. Typical sources for such a secondary research are all forms of published content, either online or offline, including the Internet, specialist databases, press and the media, advertising, blogs and forums, books or company information. Because of this multitude of information the human element in desk research is key to researching cultures. Nowadays, data and information are, potentially, available to anyone – just a mouse click away. However, it is the sense-making, by researchers who work on the secondary analysis of cultures, which constitutes the real value of desk research. Only when the pieces of information are put together to create a holistic picture of a culture or a cultural peculiarity it can serve to understand a group of people or a social framework. Researching culture in secondary market research starts with basic information on societies and people like socio-demography, median age, average household income, education level, usage of different media or technology types – like mobile phones – the political and economic system, and so on. All these basic data are used to describe a society in objective terms and figures; they are, however, only partially valid when it comes to understanding culture. For this, the market researcher has to go one step further and combine hard facts with research and analysis of traditions, behaviours and beliefs. Understanding and Researching Culture – A Secondary Approach 4 TNS Business Intelligence Silja Maria Wiedeking White is the colour of the bride, or isn’t it? According to Raymond Williams, “The traditional culture of a society will always tend to correspond to its contemporary system of interest and values, for it is not an absolute body of work but a continual selection and interpretation.”3 Whilst looking at cultures and their traditions with the help of secondary market research, the researcher is again and again faced with such cultural interpretations or associations. They are the results of century-old traditions, religious beliefs, contemporary influences, political and historical developments and form the cultural foundation of a country or people. For the desk researcher this is a vast pool of information that helps to comprehend culture. Thus, knowing particular interpretations and applying them in the right way, means being one step closer to successfully understanding of the respective culture. How important the knowledge of cultural interpretation can be, becomes apparent in a research that was conducted by TNS Business Intelligence. The client, an interior design company, intended to expand their business and offer their services and products globally. Their question was a typical one for a foreign company that is aiming to enter a new country market but is faced with local cultural connotations that they cannot comprehend.