Ethical considerations in international market entry strategies across US, European, and Asian markets

International Ethics

"One aspect of culture is that it is difficult to define universally." (Pitta). Culture represents values and patterns of thinking, feeling, and acting in identifiable groups. It represents how people of certain civilizations interact. Each culture has its own rules of conduct within the individual culture. For example, China looks at small, carefully chosen gifts as conveying a great deal of respect and is a sign that the business relationship is valued by the giver. But, universally, gifts are recognized as bribes in the business world.

Some major cultural issues include the same words in different languages can mean different things, the actions of one culture can be offensive to another culture, some cultures, China for example, become offensive about touching, Chinese views eye contact as offensive, and taboos exist in cultures. The approaches that Company A uses in marketing can be offensive, if not careful, causing the Chinese to shy away. The Chinese language does not use the word order or verbs and nouns in the same way. Trying to negotiate with customers can have repercussions if a sales associate tries to shake hands with a Chinese customer. It is important to select appropriate words to promote products, or customers can become offensive. Chinese do not directly say "no," so if a sales associate asked a direct question to a customer, it would be viewed as rude and reflect negatively on the business.

In China, if a business advertisement is comparing their business to another, like in the U.S.A., and talks about how much better they are than the other company, Chinese consider that action as bringing bad luck on the other business. This can destroy business relationships. The signing of a contract is considered the first step of a business negotiation. So, if the Chinese don't pay when they are supposed to and an American gets upset, this is viewed as a bad business relationship because the contract is just the first step. Negotiations are an ongoing thing with the Chinese. Marketing must speak to a broad audience, or it fails. (Gillikin). The best way to address marketing is through focus groups of all intended demographics that will say whether an advertisement crosses the line with customers or fails to connect with the intended group. For example, "hi" is inappropriate with the Chinese. "Yes" means they hear you, not that they agree with you.

A global mindset combines an openness to and awareness of diversity across cultures and markets with the ability to synthesize across diversity. Global knowledge is judgment, thoughts, and actions based on objective knowledge. Cross cultural skills are the ability to spot and make use of the similarities and differences. And, developing cross cultural marketing skills are essential to the success of a business. (Sall, 2010).