Low profile marketing in the Middle East

2011-12-30T08:50:00.000-08:00

Low profile marketing is a practical substitute to typical marketing in the business world. It is a strategic choice for corporations to shape their marketing strategies under a low profile umbrella. This approach covers all the tactical activities, communications, and rest of the marketing exercises that firms need to perform in a low profile manner.

In western cultures, the higher the broadcast rate the stronger the firm is perceived, whereas in Middle East and Africa it is the opposite in most of the cases. This cultural difference requires different approach in marketing practices.

In the business- to- consumer field, many food businesses depend heavily on low profiling for attracting large crowds that can help their business to leverage on low profile tools, such as word- of- mouth, referrals, smart promotion, quality of products, branding etc. thereby generating a high income, rather than spending massively on advertising mediums to attract customers to their shops.

Low-profile marketing can be practiced in the same sense, in the business-to-business arena, where one corporation (belonging to any sector such as IT, logistics, services) serves other corporations. Because of its deep cultural preference to indirect communication, a market like Middle East considers Low-profile marketing to be a good marketing strategy.

Agility's logistics is a great low profile marketing practitioner in the business to business domain form the Middle East (Agility is one of the world’s leading providers of integrated logistics with more than 22,000 employees in over 550 offices across100 countries) with its applicable marketing strategies. From its Tradelanes online magazine, to its CSR initiatives such as “Responding to the Floods in Pakistan”, to its YouTube channel and its corporate site, you can clearly identify Agility’s success which is working out fine globally yet carries its middle eastern cultural flair that is driven by its low profile B2B marketing strategies, hence positively reflecting on Agility’s corporate growth/financials without the need to conventionally brag about its marketing practices.

The current business trends play an important role in the marketing practices, such as, globalization, and business ethics. However; many marketers abuse marketing when going low profile in their marketing initiatives by tapping in the unethical marketing practices in terms of pricing, offerings and communication.. Many low profile market players mishandle the edge that it provides in terms of privacy by allocating different prices to the same product depending upon customer-purchasing power.

In the Middle East region it is recommended that a firm starts with a low profile marketing strategies for its products and services until it becomes known or unless it have well-known global brand. After that the corporate has the choice of either maintaining a low profile in its marketing practices even at a global stage, similar to the Agility case, , or changing the direction after a certain life and size of a corporate.

Based on its choice a corporate can choose to practice either a low profile marketing strategy or a high profile one at any maturity stage; however, it does not ensure higher profits than a strategic choice for a best fit of a corporate.. Agility is a good example of a corporate that successfully applies its cultural low profile marketing practices that have been taken from its root country Kuwait to the global market.

Abdulaziz Alanzi

Low profile marketing in the Middle East