When, in 2000, Coca‐Cola changed its overall strategy to “think local, act local”, you knew something important was happening. Coke had realised that its advertising needed to adapt key brand messages to national (and even regional) cultures and to be produced on a country‐by‐country basis. For many, those glib notions about globalization being the future began to seem a lot less secure. Instead of campaigns which implicitly treat people as citizens of the world, there is now a belated recognition that most people most of the time experience life locally and need to be addressed accordingly. So, for those studying or professionally involved with advertising in countries other than their own, new publications which are well‐researched, up to date, cogently written and illuminating are of great potential value.
The aim of this book is to consider various aspects of advertising (economic, institutional, legal, cultural) in a range of countries. In his preface, the editor mentions the fact that contributors to the volume are those who responded to an “e‐mail from a person they do not know and who also does not know them” (p. viii). To overcome the inherent difficulties of collaborating at a distance with previously unknown people, a schema of questions has clearly been devised, e.g. “what kind of advertising infrastructure is there?” or “are there any particular preferences concerning the use of media?” The contributors, four from Europe, three from Asia, one each from Australia, Russia, South Africa and the USA, have duly responded with respect to their own country. (There is no chapter on the UK – a surprising omission, perhaps, given British advertising’s influence, not least in the areas of self‐regulation or creativity). At their best some of these national reports are systematic and thoughtful, pitched at an appropriate level for the target readership of “international marketing students, international advertisers, and advertising agencies” (p viii). The Australian and Belgian contributions, for example, are commendably wide‐ranging and analytical. Both read well and are rounded off with a conclusion. The Belgian contributor presents intriguing insights into some of the issues involved in advertising in a small country which recognises more than one official language.
Unfortunately, the overall quality of the contributions does not match this standard. For many of the writers the question schema has become a rigid straightjacket. Chapter follows chapter presenting table after table (e.g. of the biggest advertising agencies or top advertisers), with little or no analysis or discussion of the data contained in them. Included too are lengthy verbatim extracts from relevant laws or codes of practice and lists of “useful addresses” (more than six pages of the latter in one instance). There is also a very obvious lack of stylistic co‐ordination, with some contributors writing discursively, while others opt for presentation of material in note form. Much of the book consequently resembles a straightforward reference work or an uncritically‐minded textbook.
However, some writers do manage to break free of the constraints. The Russian contributor, for example, provides a full and fascinating account of the volatile advertising situation in her homeland. However, her enthusiasm runs away with her, with the result that she also includes less directly relevant material on the ownership of the Russian media and even a lengthy anecdote about a two‐week promotional “soap opera” in a St Petersburg shop window. By contrast the USA contributor, in a disappointingly slight and incomplete contribution (barely one third the length of his Russian colleague’s), surely misjudges his readers by informing them that in advertising you need an audience, a message, the media, an advertiser and an advertising agency. By contrast, Marieke de Mooij provides an incisive introductory chapter on the influence of culture on advertising, drawing heavily on Hofstede’s (1991) model of the dimensions of national cultures and her own previous work. Multiculturalism within countries, however, might perhaps have received at least a mention here.
Many of the problems of this book – the uneven quality of the individual chapters, the striking discrepancies in their length, the inconsistent use of illustrations and bibliographical references – might have been eliminated had the editor taken a firmer line. One sympathises with him having to work at a distance with strangers, but that is a problem of his own and his publisher’s making. In addition, when a large part of the target readership requires up‐to‐date information, one questions the rationale for such a book when many of the data are available elsewhere, e.g. on the WARC or Advertising Age Web sites, where they can be kept current. Finally, a copy editor with English native speaker competence would have been a valuable asset.
