It is always instructive to work with business executives from different countries and regions of the world. For the past few years The Blake Project has been working with a number of Russian marketing executives. Our interaction with them has revealed two interesting insights.
Given the Soviet Union’s long history of propaganda infused communication (prior to Perestroika), most Russians today are very skeptical and jaded about what they see, read and hear in the media. This makes the marketer’s job even more difficult as message believability is always an issue, making proof points and ‘reasons to believe’ especially important in Russian marketing communication. This also argues for the importance of ‘customer touch point design’ (reinforcing the brand essence and promise at each customer touch point) in brand building efforts. Finally, it argues for carefully monitored congruence between what a brand promises and how it actually behaves.
The degree to which this applies to citizens of other countries is the degree to which their governments, businesses and religious and other institutions are perceived to control the issues and information to which people are exposed and how it is interpreted.
On a somewhat related note, we discovered that most company news and articles result from paid placement in Russia. There is far less opportunity (especially for large companies) to place stories through a media relations story pitching process. In Russia, the distinction between advertising and PR generated coverage is greatly diminished. Because of this, editorial independence also has less meaning.
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