In total, we visited three countries during our study abroad. Those countries were France, Monaco, and England. Even when looking at how those three countries did business, there were so many differences. We even visited quite a few businesses in those countries to learn more about those differences. So, when comparing them all to the United States, there was definitely a lot to learn.
One of the main things I found that influenced how each country did business was the culture of the people living in that country. For example, while in France, we heard a presentation about marketing luxury goods. The presenter told us that French people are really against being marketed to while on social media, so a lot of luxury companies have to find ways around that. This includes putting ads on the subway or heavily marketing to tourists instead. This was interesting to me because most U.S. brands do a majority of their marketing on social media.
Another reason why doing business is slightly different in these countries is because of some of the laws that are put in place there. One of the biggest laws has to do with ?opting in.? In the United States, you have to opt-out of being marketed to by companies, whereas in the European Union, you have to make the decision to opt-in. This means that in the EU, companies have to try even harder to capture new and interested customers. Because of that, I noticed that I got a lot of emails from businesses like Nando?s explicitly asking if I wanted to receive specific marketing emails. There was also an app developed that helped to bring in customers in untraditional ways. We heard from the founder and the app is called Loke. Essentially, it is a platform that restaurants can use to publish and market deals to increase revenue. I have never even heard of apps like this existing in the United States.
Overall, there were a lot of differences between the countries we visited and the United States, with doing business being one of them. Of course, with this being a marketing study abroad, we learned a lot about those differences in the scope of marketing. I am grateful to have these new perspectives on how other countries do business and they will definitely help me in my future career in the business world.
