Eurasia is not USA. Yes, this
sounds like tautology, but stay tuned and let me explain. By saying Eurasia, I
mean Russia in the first place. Yes, that country of contrasts, where business
mechanism vastly differs from Europe’s and USA’s.
The first thing you should
know before developing a marketing strategy to invade to Eurasian market is
that – it’s very diverse. That’s why, you can’t afford yourself to blindly
believe in market research results. Cause in Russia poverty and wealthiness
exist very close to each other. Cities that are highly adapted for foreign
product and investment alternate with those which are totally closed for any
kind of foreign economical impact.
Russian economy varies a lot on all of it’s territory
So how to act?
While planning your product’s
integration strategy in Eurasian market focus on as little territory as
possible. You shall always keep in mind, that the fact that your product is
being sold perfectly well in Moscow, doesn’t mean that it can’t be a total
failure in St. Petersburg(even though they have almost the same demographics).
By now, you probably think that the things I say are common for market of any
country. And you’re absolutely right. But here’s what makes the real
difference:
Though
Russian market may seem not very welcoming; it’s not oversaturated with
high-quality products and opens great opportunities for foreign business
expansion
When you launch a product in
two cities with similar demographics of the same country in Europe you can very
reasonably expect that the difference in sales rates in those 2 won’t exceed
5%. Maximum 10%. But that’s it. Scattering rate very rarely outruns those 10%.
But when you start a product
promotion campaign in Russia, in 2 cities with same percentage of your
prospects among the population, same religious views, same mentality e.t.c you
can easily get the sales scattering rate to be 20%; 40% and up to 60%
So, once again, rule #1:
While planning to launch the product to Eurasian
market, set your market research’s territorial borders as narrow as possible.
