The impact of culture on marketing at the bottom of the pyramid : a relationship creation and network development approach

Abstract

The paper commences with a justification as to why in international marketing it is appropriate to conduct research into business opportunities at the “bottom of the pyramid” in developing countries. The point will be made that whilst most of the focus in developing countries to date has been on the upper and middle classes in these countries, the potential for the future is with the lower and rural classes (bottom of the pyramid) who represent the bulk of the population. It is argued however that a different approach will be necessary to reach this group. Underlying this approach is a need for both cultural awareness and cultural sensitivity as cultural differences at the bottom of the pyramid are more likely to be more deeply ingrained due to this group being less exposed to ‘western influences’. For this reason the paper explores whether an emic approach is preferable to an etic approach when measuring cultural differences. The paper then investigates the relationship between culture and relationship creation and network formation in developing countries and whether there are differences between the upper/middle class (UMC) and those at the bottom of the pyramid (BOP). Issue is taken with the relevance of existing measures of cultural difference in the literature as they use the nation state as the segmentation variable and in the process ignore any difference that might exist within the country between upper/middle classes and those at the bottom of the pyramid. These etic measures ignore the existence of cultural variables that are not global in application nor ‘western’ derived, but unique to a single country or group of countries. Research was carried out in three developing countries. In each case marketing professionals in the country were asked re their views as to how a number of etic cultural measures impacted on communication with (1) upper/middle class customers and (2) lower class urban/rural customers. Some of the variables were relevant to all three markets suggesting an etic approach should be applied and some other variables were not suggesting an emic approach might be preferable. The earlier review of the literature on the impact of culture on relationship creation and network formation is then revisited in the light of the above findings with a view to assessing the impact of such findings on relationship creation and network formation at the BOP. Evidence points to there being a need for networks of relationships at the BOP to be based on sensitivity to deeply embedded cultural differences. They will require a deep understanding of the local environment and involve a ‘bottom-up’ approach resulting from identifying, leveraging and shoring up existing social infrastructure.

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